Southern history of the war : the second year of the war

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A L E X. H. ST E VE N S.

Eagraired lor llie Second Tear of tis War.

SOUTHERN HISTORY OF THE WAR.

THE

6 6 ?

SECOID YEAR OF THE WAR.

■BY V

EDWAED A:"P0LLAED,

EDITOR OF THE RICHMOND EXAMINER, AUTHOR OF " FIRST YEAR OF THE WAE."

NEW YORK:
CHAELES B. RICHARDSON,

596 BKOADWAY
1864.

58141

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 18.68,

By CHARLES B. EICHAEDSON,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for tbe

Southern District of New York.

PREFACE.

In presenting a second volume of a popular History of the
Southern "War for Independence, the author gratefully acknowl-
edges the kind reception by the Southern public of his first
volume, the generous notices of the independent Press of the
Confederacy, and the encouragement of ft-iends. He has no
disposition to entreat criticism or importune its charities. But
he would be incapable of gratitude, if he was not sensible of
the marks of public generosity which have been given to a
work which made no pretensions to severe or legitimate history,
and ventm'ed upon no solicitations of literary success.

He can afford no better vindication of the character and ob-
jects of his work than by qiioting here what was prefixed to
one of the editions of his first volume :

" Every candid mind must be sensible of the futility of at-
tempting a high order of historical composition in the treat-
ment of recent and incomplete events ; but it does not follow
that the contemporary annal, the popular narrative, and other
inferior degrees of history, can have no value and interest
because they cannot compete in accuracy with the future
retrospect of events. The vulgar notion of history is, that it
is a record intended for posterity. The author contends that
histoiy has an office to perform in the present, and that one
of the greatest values of contemporary annals is to vindicate in
good time to the world the fame and reputation of nations."

"With this object constantly in view, the author has com-

IV PKEFACE.

posed tliis work. He will accomplisli Ids object, and be re-
warded with a complete satisfaction, if his unpretending book
shall have the effect of promoting more extensive inquiries;
enlightening the present ; vindicating the principles of a great
contest to the contemporary world; and putting before the
living generation in a convenient form of literature, and at an
early and opportune time, the name and deeds of our people."

Richmond, August, 1863.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER L

The New Orleans Disaster.— Its Consequences and Effects. — Dispatches of th«
European Commissioners. — Butler "the Beast." — Public Opinion in Europe.— The
Atrocities of the Massachusetts Tyrant. — Execution of Mumford. — Lesson of New
Orleans. — Spirit of Resistance in the South. — Change in the Fortunes of the Con-
federacy.— Two Leading Causes for it. — The Richmond "Examiner." — The Conscrip-
tion Law. — Governor Brown of Georgia. — Reorganization of the Army. — Abandon-
ment of our Frontier Defences. — The Policy of Concentration. — Governor Rector's
Appeal. — First Movements of the Summer Campaign in Virginia. — The Retreat from
Yorktown. — Evacuation of Norfolk. — Destruction of the "Virginia." — Commodore
Tatnall's Report.— Secretary Mallory's Visit to Norfolk. — The Engagement of Wil-
liamsburg.— The Affair of Barhamsville. — McClellan's Investment of the Lines of the
Chickahominy. — Alarm in Richmond. — The Water Avenue of the James. — The Pauie
in Official Circles. — Consternation in the President's House. — Correspondence be-
tween President Davis and the Legislature of Virginia. — Noble Resolutions of the
Legislature. — Response of the Citizens of Richmond. — The Bombardment of Drewry's
Bluff.— The Mass Meeting at the City Hall.— Renewal of Public Confidence.— The
Occasions of this. — Jackson's Campaign in the Valley. — The Engagement of
McDowell, — The Surprise at Front Royal. — Banks' Retreat down the Valley. — The
Engagements of Port Republic— Results of the Campaign.- Death of Turner Ash-
by.— Sufferings of the People of the Valley of the Shenandoah.- Memoir of Turneb
ASHBT Paok 17

CHAPTER n.

The Situation of Richmond. — Its Strategic Importance.— What the Yankees had
done to secure Richmond. — The Battle of Seven Pines. — Miscarriage of Geo.
Johnston's Plans. — The Battles of the Chickahominy. — Storming of the Enemy's
Intrenchments.— McClellan driven from his Northern Line of Defences. — The
Situation on the other Side of the Chickahominy.— Magruder's Comment.— The
Affair of Savage Station.— The Battle of Frazler's Farm.— A Terrible Crisis.— Battle
of Malvern Hill.— The Enemy in Communication with his Gunboats.— The Failure
to cut him off. — Glory and Fruits of our Victory. — Misrepresentations of the Yan-
kees.—Safety of Richmond.— The War in other Parts of the Confederacy.— The
Engagement of Secessionville.— The Campaign of the West.— The Evacuation of
Corinth.— More Yankee Falsehoods.— Capture of Memphis.— The Prize of the Mis-
sissippi.- Statistics of its Navigation.— Siege of Vicksburg. — Heroism of " the Queen
City."— Morgan's Raid into Kentucky.— The Tennessee and Virginia Frontier. —
Pr.ispects in the West. — Plan of Campaign there Page 59

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER III.

Effect of McClellan's Defeat in the North.— Call for more Troops.— Why the North
was not easily dispirited. — The War as a Money Job. — Note: Gen. Washington's
Opinion of New Enjjland. — The Yankee Finances.— Exasperation of Hostilities. — Tlie
Yankee Idea of a " Vigorous Prosecution of the War." — Ascendancy of the Eadicals.
— War Measures at Washington. — Anti-Slavery Aspects of the War. — Brutality of the
Yankees. — The Insensibility of Europe. — Yankee Chaplains in Virginia. — Seizures of
Private Property. — Pope's Orders in Virginia. — Steiuwehr's Order respecting Host-
ages.— The Character and Services of Gen. John Pope. — The " Army of Virginia." —
Irruption of the Northern Spoilsmen. — The Yaxnkee Trade in Counterfeit Confederate
Notes. — Pope's " Chasing the Rebel Hordes." — Movement against Pope by " Stone-
wall" Jackson. — Battle of Cedar Mountain. — McClellan recalled from the Penin-
sula.— The Third Grand Army of the North. — Jackson's Surprise of tlie Enemy at
Manassas. — A Eapid and Masterly Movement. — Change of the Situation. — Attack by
the Enemy upon Bristow Station and at Manassas Junction. — Marshalling of the
Hosts. — Longstreet's Passage of Thoroughfare Gap. — The Plans of Gen. Lee. — Spirit
of our Troops. — Their Painful Marches. — The Skcond Battle of Manassas. — A ter-
rible Bayonet Charge. — Eout of the Enemy. — A liideous Battle-field. — Gen. Lee and
the Summer Campaign of Virginia. — Jackson's Share in it. — E.xtent of the Great
Victory of Manassas. — Excitement in Washington. — The Yankee Army falls back
upon Alexandria and Washington. — Eeview of the Situation. — Eapid Change in our
Military Fortunes. — What the South had accomplislied. — Comparison of Material
Strength between North and South. — Humiliating Eesult to the Warlike Eeputation
of the North Page 82

CHAPTER lY.

Eescue of Virginia from the Invader. — Gen. Loring's Campaign in the Kanawha
V^ley. — A Novel Theatre of the War. — Gen. Lee's Passage of the Potomac. — His
Plans. — Disposition of ou<" Forces. — McClellan again at the Head of the Yankee
Army. — The Battle of Boonsboko'. — TnE Capture of Harper's Ferry. — Its Fruits
— The B.\ttle of Sharpsburo. — Great Superiority of the Enemy's Numbers. — Fury
of the Battle. — The Bridge of Antietam. — A Drawn Battle. — Spectacles of Carnage. —
The Unburied Dead. — Gen. Lee retires into Virginia. — McClellan's Pretence ot
Victory. — The Ati'air of Shepherdstown. — Charges against McClellan. — His Disgrace.
— Eeview of the Maryland Campaign. — Misrepresentations of Gen. Lee's Objects. —
His Eetreat. — Comment of the New York "Tribune." — The Cold Eeception of the
Confederates in Maryland. — Excuses for the Timidity of the Marylanders. — What
■was accomplished by the Summer Campaign of 1SG2.— The Outburst of Applause in
Europe. — Tribute from the London " Times." — Public Opinion in England.— Dis-
tinction between the People and the Government. — The Mask of England. — Our For-
eign Relations in the War.— An Historical Parallelof Secession.— Two Eemarks on
the "Neutrality" of Europe.— The Yankee Blockade and -the Treaty of Paris.— The
Confederate Privateers.— Temper of the South.— Fruits of the Blockade.... Page 123

CHAPTER Y.

Movements in the West.- The splendid Programme of the Yankees.— Kentucky
the critical Point.— Gen. Kirby Smith's Advance into Kentucky.— The Battle of
Richmond.— Eeception of the Confederates in Lexington.— Expectation of an Attaclf

CONTENTS. 7

on Cinciunati. — Gen. Bragg's Plans. — Smith's Movement to Bragg's Lines. — Escape
of the Yankee Forces from Cumberland Gap. — Afiair of Munfordsville. — Gen. Bia^j?
between the Enemy and the Ohio. — An Opportunity for a decisive Blow. — Buell'a
Escape to Louisville. — The Inauguration of Governor at Frankfort. — An idle Cere-
mony.— Probable Surprise of Gen. Bragg. — The Battle of Perrtville. — Its Im-
mediate Results in our Favor. — Bragg's failure to concentrate his Forces. — His Reso-
lution of Retreat. — Scenes of the Retreat from Kentucky. — Errors of the Campaign. —
A lame Excuse. — Public Sentiment in Kentucky. — The Demoralization of that
State. — The Lessons of Submission Page 148

CHAPTER VI.

Onr Lines in the Southwest. — Gen. Breckenridge's Attack on Baton Rouge.— De-
Btruction of the Ram Arkansas. — Gen. Price's Reverse at luka. — Desperate Fighting. —
The Battle of Corinth. — Van Doru's hasty Exultations. — The Massacre of College
Hill. — Wild and terrible Courage of the Confederates. — Our Forces beaten Back. —
Our Lines of Retreat secured. — The Military Prospects of the South overshadowed.
— The Department of the Tkans-Mississippi. — Romance of the War in Missouri. —
Schofield's Order calling out the Militia. — Atrocities of the Yankee Rule in Missouri.
— Robbery without "Red Tape." — The GuerriUa Campaign. — The Atfair of Kirks-
ville. — Execution of Col. McCuUough. — The Aflair of Lone Jack. — Timely Reinforce-
ment of Lexington by the Yankees. — The Palmyra Massacre. — The Question of Re-
taliation with the South. — The Military and Political Situation. — Survey of the
Military Situation. — Capture of Galveston by the Yankees. — The Enemy's Naval
Power. — His Iron-clads. — Importance of Foundries in the South. — Prospect in the
Southwest. — Prospect in Tennessee. — Prospect in Virginia. — Stuart's Raid into Penn-
sylvania.— Souvenirs of Southern Chivalry. — The "Soft-mannered Rebels." — Political
Complexion of the War in the North. — Lincoln's "Emancipation Proclamation." —
History of Yankee Legislation in the War. — Political Error of the Emancipation Proc-
lamation.— Its Effect on the South. — The Decay of European Sympathy with the
Abolitionists. — What the War accomplished for Negro Slavery in the South. — Yankee
Falsehoods and Bravadoes in Europe. — Delusion of Conquering the South by Starva-
tion.— Caricatures in the New York Pictorials. — The noble Eloquence of Hunger and
Kags. — Manners in the South. — Yankee Warfare. — The Desolation of Virginia. —
The Lessons of harsh Necessity. — Improvement of the Civil Administration of
the Confederacy. — Ordnance, Manufacturing Resources, Quartermasters' Supplies,
etc Page 164

CHAPTER YH.

The Heroism of Virginia. — Her Battle-fields. — Burnside's Plan of Campaign. —
Calculations of his Movement upon Fredericksburg. — Failure to surprise Gen. Lee. —
The Battle of Fredericksburg. — The Enemy crossing the River. — Their Bombard-
ment of the Town. — Scenes of Distress. — The Battle on the Eight Wing. — The Stoiy
of Marye's Heights. — Repulse of the Enemy. — The old Lesson of barren Victory. —
Death of Gen. Cobb. — Death of Gen. Gregg.— Romance of the Story of Fredericks-
burg.—Her noble Women.— Yankee Sacking of the Town.— A Specimen of Yankee
Warfare in North Carolina.— Designs of the Enemy in this State.— The Engagements
of Kinston. — Glance at other Theatres of the War. — Gen. Hindman's Victory at
Prairie Grove.— Achievements of our Cavalry in the West.— The Affair of Harts-
ville.— Col. Clarkson's Expedition.— Condition of Events at the Close of the Year
1862 Page 104

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER YIII.

Tba eastern Portion of Tennessee. — Its Military Importance. — Composition cf
Brag^'s Army. — The Batflb of Murfreesboeo'. — The Eight Wing of the Enemy
routed. — Bragg's Exultations. — The Assault of the 2d of January. — " The bloody
crossing of Stone River." — The Confederates fall back to TuUahoma. — Eeviewof tho
Battle-field of Murfreesboro'. — Eepulse of the Enemy at Vicksburg. — The Eecap-
TtJBE OF Galveston. — The Midnight March. — Capture of the " Harriet Lane." —
Arkansas Post taken by the Yankees. — Its Advantages. — The affair of the Earns in
Charleston Harbor. — Naval structure of the Confederacy. — Capture of the Yankee
gunboat " Queen of the West." — Heroism of George Wood. — Capture of the " In-
dianola."— The War on the Water. — The Confederate Cruisers. — Prowess of the
" Alabama." Page 204

CHAPTER IX.

An extraordinary Lull in the War. — An Affair with the Enemy on the Black-
water. — Eaids in the West. — Van Dorn's Captures. — The Meeting of Congress. —
Character of this Body. — Its Dulness and Servility. — Mr. Foote and the Cabinet. —
Two Popular Themes of Confidence. — Party Contention in the North. — Successes of
the Democrats there. — Analysis of the Party Politics of the North. — The Interest of
New England in the War. — How the War affected the Northwestern Portions of the
United States. — Mr. Foote's Eesolutions respecting the Northwestern States. — How
they were received by the Southern Public. — New War Measures at Washington. —
Lincoln a Dictator. — Prospect of Foreign Interference. — Action of the Emperor Na-
poleon.— Suffering of the Working Classes in England. — The Delusions of an early
Peace. — The Tasks before Congress. — Prostrate Condition of the Confederate Fi-
nances.— President Davis's Blunder. — The Errors of our Financial System. — The
Wealth of the South. — The Impressment Law of Congress. — Scarcity of Supplies. —
Inflated Prices.— Speculation and Extortion in the Confederacy. — Three Eemarks
about these.— The Verdict of History Page 225

CHAPTER X.

Character of Military Events of the Spring of 1863.— Eepulse of tho Enemy at Fort
McAllister.— The Siege of Vioksburo.— The Yazoo Pass Expedition.— Confederate
Success at Fort Pemberton.— The Enemy's Canals, or " Cut-offs."— Their Failure.—
Bombardment of Port Hudson.— Destruction of "The Mississippi."— A Funeral
Pyre.— Happy Effects of our Victory.— A Eeview of the line of inland Hostilities. —
Hooker's hesitation on the Eappahannock.— The Assignment of Confederate com-
mands west of the Mississippi.- The Affair of Kelly's Ford.— Death of Major Pel-
ham.— Naval Attack on Charleston.— Destruction of " The Keokuk."— Scenery of
the Bombardment,— Extent of the Confederate Success.— Events in Tennessee and
Kentucky. — Pegram's Eeverse.— The Situation of Hostilities at the close of April,
]^ge2 Page 238

CHAPTER XI.

Close of the Second Year of the War. Propriety of an Outline of some succeed-
ing Events.— Cavalry Enterprises of the Enemy.— The raids in Mississippi and Vir-
ginia.—Sketch OF THE Battles of the Eapfahannook.— The Enemy's Plan of Attack.

CONTENTS. 9

— The Fight at Chancellorsville. — The Splendid Charge of "Stonewall" Jackson. —
The Fight at Fredericksburg. — The Fight at Salem Ohurcli. — Summary of our Victory.
— Death oj " Stohewall" Jackson. — His Character and Services Paqk 254

CHAPTER XII.

A Period of Disasters. — Department of the Mississippi. — Grant's March npon
Vicksburg. — Its Steps and Incidents. — The Engagement of Port Gibson. — Tiie Evacu-
ation of Jackson. — The Battle of Baker's Creek. — Pemberton's Declarations as to the
Defence of Vicksburg. — A grand Assault upon the " Heroic City." — Its Repulse. —
The Final Surrender of Vicksburg. — How the Public Mind of the South was shocked.
— Consequences of the Disaster. — How it involved affairs on the Lower Mississippi.
— Other Theatres of the War. — The Campaign in Pennstlvania and Maryland. —
Hooker manoeuvred out of Virginia. — The Recapture of Winchester. — The Second
Invasion of the Northern Territory. — The Alarm of the North. — Gen. Lee's object in
the Invasion of Maryland and Pennsylvania. — His Essays at Conciliation. — The Er-
ror of such Policy. — The advance of his Lines into Pennsylvania. — The Battle of
Gettysburg. — The Three Days' Engagements. — Death of Barksdale. — Pickett's splen-
did Charge on the Batteries. — Repulse of the Confederates. — Anxiety and Alarm in
Richmond. — Lee's safe Retreat into Virginia. — Mystery of his Movement. — Recovery

of the Confidence of the South Review of the Present Aspects of the

War. — Comparison between the Disasters of 18(32 and those of 1863. — Tlie Vitals of
the Confederacy yet untouched. — Review of the Civil Administration. — President
Davis, his Cabinet, and his Favorites. — His private Quarrels. — His Deference to Euro-
pean Opinion. — Decline of the Finances of the Confederacy. — Reasons of their Decline.
The Confederate Brokers. — The Blockade Runners. — The Disatfections of Property-
holders. — The Spirit of the Army. — The Moral Resolution of the Confederacy. — How
the Enemy has strengthened it. — The Prospects of the Future Page 269

CHAPTER Xni.

EEVIEW — POLITICAL IDEAS IN THE NORTH, &C.

The Dogma of Numerical Majorities. — Its Date in the Yankee Mind. — Demoraliza-
tion of the Idea of the Sovereignty of Numbers. — Experience of Minorities in Ameri-
can Politics.— Source of the Doctrine of " Consolidation." — The Slavery Question the
logical Result of Consolidation. — Another Aspect of Consolidation in the Tariff. —
Summary of the Legislation on the Tariff. — A Yankee Picture of the Poverty of the
South. — John C. Calhoun. — President Davis's Opinion of his School of Politics. —
"Nullification," as a Union Measure.— Mr. Webster's "Four Exhaustive Proposi-
tions."—The True Interpretation of the Present Struggle of the South.— The North-
ern Idea of the Sovereignty of Numbers.— Its Results in this War. — President Lin-
coln's Office. — The Revenge of the Yankee Cougress npon the People. — The easy
Surrender of their Liberties by the Y''ankees. — Lincoln and Cromwell. — Explanation
of the Political Subserviency in the North. — Superficial Political Education of the
Yankee.— His " Civilization."— The Moral Nature of the Yankee unmasked by the
War.— His new Political System.— Burnside's "Death Order."— A Bid for Confeder-
ate Scalps. — A new Interpretation of the War. — The North as a Parasite. — The Foun-
dations of the National Independence of the South. — Present Aspects of the War.—
Its external Condition and Moral^.— The Spirit of the South and the Promises of the
Future Page 292

1 0 CONTENTS.

APPENDIX.

I. Thb Seven Days' Contests : June 25-July 1, 1862. — By a Prussian Officer in
the Confederate Army Paoe 309

II. The Battle oe GEmrsBURa and the Campaign in Pennsylvania. — Diary of
an English Officer in the Confederate Army Page 826

Chbonoloot Paoe 875

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

CHAPTER I.

The New Orleans Disaster. — Its Consequences and Effects. — Dispatches of the
European Commissioners. — Butler "the Beast." — Public Opinion in Europe.— The
Atrocities of the Massachusetts Tyrant. — Execution of Mumford. — Lesson of New-
Orleans. — Spirit of Resistance in the South. — Change in the Fortunes of the Con-
federacy.— Two Leading Causes for it. — The Eichuiond "Examiner." — The Conscrip-
tion Law.— Governor Brown of Georgia. — Reorganization of the Army. — Abandon-
ment of our Frontier Defences. — The Policy of Concentration. — Governor Rector's
Appeal. — First Movements of the Summer Campaign in Virginia. — The Retreat from
Torktown. — Evacuation of Norfolk. — Destruction of the "Virginia." — Commodore
Tatnall's Report.— Secretary Mallory's Visit to Norfolk. — The Engagement of Wil-
liamsburg.— The Affair of Barhamsville. — McClellan's Investment of the Lines of the
Chickahominy. — Alarm in Richmond. — The Water Avenue of the James. — The Panic
in Official Circles. — Consternation in the President's House. — Correspondence be-
tween President Davis and the Legislature of Virginia. — Noble Resolutions of the
Legislature. — Response of the Citizens of Richmond. — The Bombardment of Drewry"a
Bluff. — The Mass Meeting at the City Hall. — Renewal of Public Contidence. — The
Occasions of this. — Jackson's Campaign in the Vallet. — The Engagement of
McDowell. — The Surprise at Front Royal. — Banks' Retreat down the Valley. — The
Engagements of Port Republic. — Results of the Campaign. — Death of Turner Ash-
by.— Sufferings of the People of the Valley of the Shenandoah. — Memoir of Tcknee

ASHBT.

The fall of New Orleans was one of the most extraordinary
triumphs which the enemy had obtained. It was the crown-
ing stroke of that extraordinary campaign of the winter and
spring of the year 1862, in M'hich, by the improvidence of the
Southern authorities, and a false military policy which divided
their armies and weakened them by undue dispersion, they
had lost much of their territory, most of the prestige of their
arms, and had fallen upon a train of disasters well calculated
to affect the general public, both at home and abroad. The
close of this campaign, so ill-starred to the Confederacy, found
it with scarcely more than three entire States — Texas, Ala-
bama, and Geoi'gia. Large portions of the territories of Vir-
ginia, the Carolinas, and Florida were occupied by the enemy ;
he had broken our line of defences in Tennessee, and held im-

2

18 . THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

portant positions on the Upper Mississippi ; and now, by the
capture of New Orleans, he had secured the great Southern
depot of the trade of the immense central valley of the conti-
nent, obtained command of an extent of territory accessible by
his gunboats greater than the entire country before lost to the
Confederacy, and had good reason to hope, by the junction ot
his fleets on the Mississippi, to open its navigation, and give to
the West an outlet to the ocean.

The conquests of the Federal arms made in the winter and
spring of 1862, were not without their effect in Europe, and
presented to the nations in that part of the world a sombre pic-
ture of the Confederacy. The dispatches of our ministers at
the courts of England and France declared that the prospect
of recognition, of which they had formerly given such warm
and sanguine assurances, had been overclouded by the disaster
at New Orleans. Mr. Slidell wrote from Paris that the French
government declared that "if New Orleans had not fallen,
our recognition could not have been much longer delayed."
He added, however, that he had been assured that " even after
that disaster, if we obtained decided successes in Yirginia and
Tennessee, or could hold the enemy at bay a month or two,
the same result would follow" — a promise, to the breach of
which, and to the unhappy expectations which it excited, we
shall hereafter have occasion to refer. Mr. Mason, our minis-
ter at London, also referred to the opinion that at the time of
the enemy's capture of New Orleans, our recognition was on
the eve of accomplishment.

The immediate sufferers of the disaster at New Orleans were
the people of that city. It was aptly rewarded for its easy
submission by the scourge of a tyrant. The corrupt and mer-
ciless master of this great emporium. General Butler of Mas-
sachusetts, was a man who found no merit in submission, un-
less such as grovelled in the dust and paid personal court and
pecuniary tribute to himself. The rule of this vulgar and
drunken man excited the horror and disgust of the civilized
world, and secured for him in the South the popular sobri-
quet of " the Beast." His order which stigmatized as prosti-
tutes the ladies of New Orleans, who betrayed in the streets
or from the balconies their indignation against the invaders
of their city, while it made him the hero of the hour in the

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE. 19

ISTorth with a people who admired the coarse spirit of the
bully, drew upon him the execrations of all humane and honor-
able people. In the British Parliament, Lord Palmerston de
clared the proclamation to be " infamous," and the condemna-
tion of the indecent and dirty edict was echoed by the press oi
Europe.*

The acts of the tyrant of New Orleans surpassed all former
atrocities and outrages of the war. In frequent instances,
citizens, Accused by Butler of contumacious disloyalty, were
confined at hard labor, with balls and chains attached to their
limbs ; and sometimes this degrading punishment was inflicted
upon men whose only oiFence was that of selling medicines to
the sick soldiers of the Confederacy. Helpless women were
torn from their homes and confined in prison. One of these —
a Mrs. Phillips — was accused of laughing as the funeral train
of a Yankee ofiicer passed her doors ; she was seized, and
with an ingenious and devilish cruelty, her sentence was pro-
nounced by Butler — imprisonment on an island of barren sand
under a tropical sun. Various pretexts were invented for

* The "Order 28," -vvMch has stigmatized its brutal author throughout
Christendom, was at first refused publication by all the newsi^apers in Ne^n
Orleans. It was then copied on sheets of paper and surreptitiously posted
on many of the principal corners of the streets in the immediate neighbor-
hood of the St. Charles Hotel. The next day all of the newspaper offices
were ordered to be closed for disobedience of orders. On this becoming
known, the True Delta paper published the order, and the other newspapers
timidly submitted to the force of circumstances, and published it also. The
natural excitement and indignation that followed throughout the community
is indescribable. Several lady subscribers sent to the newspaper offices and
iudiguantly and positively forbade that such papers should longer be left at
their dwellings. Mayor Monroe, vnih. a party of influential citizens, at once
caUed on the Beast and endeavored to obtain some qualification of the order ;
but they could get no satisfaction and were rudely dismissed. Mayor Monroe
then wrote an indignant and re^jroachful commiinication to Butler, and again
pressed him for a modification of the hateful order. Butler then sent for the
Iilayor. Mayor Monroe replied, " Tell General Butler my office is at the
City Hotel, where he can see me, if desirable." Butler retorted, that unless
the Mayor came at once to his headquarters, he would send an armed force
to arrest and bring him there. Further opposition being useless, the Mayor,
chief of police, and several friends, then went to the St. Charles Hotel, where
they found the Beast in a towering rage. Butler claimed to be much insulted
at the conduct of the Mayor, and without ceremony or delay, sent Mr. Mon-
roe and those who accompanied him to prison. In a few days they were all
shipped down to Fort Jackson.

20 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

plundering the inhabitants of the conquered city ; men were
forced to elect between starvation by the confiscation of all
their property and taking an oath of allegiance to the invaders
of their country ; fines were levied at pleasure, and recusants
threatened with ball and chain.

The conduct of the negroes in New Orleans became intoler-
able to their owners. They were fed, clothed, and quartered
by the Yankees, who fraternized with them generally in a
shameful way. The planters in the neighborhood of the city
were required to share their crops with the commanding gen-
eral, his brother, Andrew J. Butler, and other officers; and
when this partnership was refused, the plantations were robbed
of every thing susceptible of removal, and the slaves taken
from their owners and compelled to work under the bayonets
of Yankee guards.

It would occupy many pages to detail what the people of
^N'ew Orleans suffered at the hands of the invaders whom they
had so easily admitted into their city, in insult, wrongs, confis-
cation of property, seizure of private dwellings, and brazen
robbery. The Yankee officers, from colonel to lieutenant, as
the caprice of each might dictate, seized and took possession
of gentlemen's houses, broke into their wine-rooms, forced
open the wardrobes of ladies and gentlemen, and either used
or sent away from the city the clothing of whole families.
Some of the private residences of respectable citizens were
appropriated to the vilest uses, the officials who had engaged
them making them the private shops of the most infamous
female characters.

But while Butler was thus apparently occupied with the op-
pression of " rebels," he was too much of a Yankee to be lost
to the opportunity of making his pecuniary fortune out of the
exigencies which he had created. The banker and broker of
the corrupt operations in which he was engaged was his own
brother, who bought confiscated property, shipped large con-
signments from New Orleans, to be paid for in cotton, and
speculated largely in poM^der, saltpetre, muskets, and other war
material sold to the Confederacy, surreptitiously sent out from
the city and covered by permits for provisions. Of the trade
in provisions for cotton, Butler received his share of the gains,
while the robbery was covered up by the pretence of consump-

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 21

tion in ]!Tew Orleans " to prevent starvation," or by reported
actual issue to troops. The Yankee general did not hesitate to
deal in the very life-blood of his own soldiers.

The rule of Butler in New Orleans is especially memorable
for the deliberate murder of William B. Mumford, a citizen oi
the Confederate States, against whom the tyrant had invented
the extraordinary charge that he had insulted the flag of the
United States. The fact was, that before the city had surren-
dered, Mumford had taken down from the mint the enemy's
flag. The ensign was wrongfully there ; the city had not sur-
rendered; and even in its worst aspects, the act of Mumford
was simply one of war, not deserving death* still less the death
of a felon. The horrible crime of murdering in cold blood an
unresisting and non-combatant captive, was completed by But-
ler on the Tth of June. On that day, Mumford, the martyr,
was publicly executed on the gallows. The Massachusetts
coward and tyrant had no ear or heart for the pitiful pleadings
made to save the life of his captive, especially by his unhappy
wife, who in her supplications for mercy was rudely repulsed,
and at times answered with drunken jokes and taunts. The
execution took place in the sight of thousands of panic-stricken
citizens. None spoke but the martyr himself. His voice was
loud and clear. Looking up at the stars and stripes which
floated high over the scene before him, he remarked that he
had fought under that flag twice, but it had become hateful to
bim, and he had torn it and trailed it in the dust. " I con-
sider," said the brave young man, " that the manner of my
death will be no disgrace to my wife and child ; my country
will honor them."

The experience of New Orleans gave a valuable lesson to
the South. It exhibited the consequences of submission to tlie
enemy in confiscation, brutality, military domination, insult,
universal poverty, the beggary of thousands, the triumph of
the vilest individuals in the community, the abasement of the
honest and industrious, and the outlawry of the slaves. The
spirit of resistance in the South was fortified by Uie enemy's
exhibitions of triumph, and the resolution gained ground that
it was much better to consign the cities of the Confederacy to
the flames than to surrender them to the enemy. A time was
approaching when Yankee gunboats were to lose their prestige

22 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

of terror, when cities were no longer to be abandoned or snr-
rendered on the approach of a foe; and when the freomen ot
the South were to be taught how, bj a spirit above fear and
ready for all sacrifice, they might" defy the most potent agencies
of modern warfare.

With the bright month of May a new era was dawning on
the fortunes of the Confederacy. This happy change of for-
tune was due not only to the improved resolution of the South.
It is in a great degree to be attributed to two leading causes in
the military administration. These were, iSrst, the conscription
law, with the consequent reorganization of the army ; aiid,
secondly, the abandonment of our plan of frontier defence, which
made way for the superior and more fortunate polic}^ of the con-
centration of our forces in the interior.

The first suggestion of a conscription law was made by the
Richmond Examiner — a bold and vigilant leader of the news-
paper press of the Confederacy. It was met with violent op-
position from the administration, with the clamor of demagogi-
cal presses that the suggestion conveyed a reflection upon the
patriotism of the country, and with the fashionable nonsense
that it was a confession calculated to give aid and comfort to
the enemy. But the early advocates of conscription enjoyed
the singular triumph of converting public opinion completely
to their side, and forcing the government at a future period to
the confession that the system which it had at first frowned
upon had proved the salvation of the country.

At the beginning of the war we had nothing that deserved
the title of a military system. There was no lack of zeal or
determination in the South ; but the organization of the army
was defective, its discipline was retarded by bad laws, and at
a time that the forces of the enemy in Yii-ginia had reached
the highest state of efficiency, our own army was passing
through successive stages of disorganization to dissolution.
The army of the enemy was superior to our own in every re-
spect, except courage and good cause ; they had every guaranty
of success that numbers, discipline, complete organization, and
perfect equipments could effect.

The military system of the South dates from the passage of
the conscription law. To this measure must be attributed thai
solidity in the organization of our army, and that efficiency

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 23

which challenged the admiration of the world. The beneficial
effects of this enactment were soon manifest as well to our-
selves as to the world. It distributed over the Confederacy
the levies in proportion to the inhabitants of each State and
county; it centralized the organization of the army, and it
introduced a regular system of recruiting, which guaranteed
that the efficiency of the army would not be impaired by the
lapse of time and the loss of health and life incident to war-
fare.

The conscription law came not a moment too soon. The
acts of Congress providing for re-enlistments liad failed to
effect the desired object. Without decadence of the real valor
of our people, or their invincible determination to achieve their
independence, the spirit of volunteering had died out, and tlie
resolution of our soldiers already in the field was not sufficient
to resist the prospects, cherished for months amid the sufferings
and monotony of the camps, of returning to their homes.
The exigency was critical, and even vital. In a period of
thirty days the terms of service of one hundred and forty-eight
regiments expired. There was good reason to believe that a
large majority of the men had not re-enlisted, and of those
who had re-enlisted, a very large majority had entered compa-
nies which could never be assembled, or if assembled, could
not be prepared for the field in time to meet the invasion ac-
tually commenced.

The first act of conscription was passed on the 16th of
April, 1862. It was afterwards enlarged by another act (27th
September), giving the Executive the power to call into ser-
vice persons between the ages of thirty-five and forty-five.
Although the rush of volunteers had comparatively ceased,
and the ardor of the individual did not suffice for the proffer of
self-devotion, yet the sentiments and convictions of the mass
recognized as the most sacred obligation the stern duty of de-
fending, if needs be, with their entire numbers, their imperilled
liberty, fortune, and honor. The conscription law was, gener-
ally, cheerfully acquiesced in. In every State one or more
camps of instruction, for the reception and training of con-
scripts was established ; and to each State an officer, styled a
commandant of conscripts, was appointed, charged with tlie
Bupervision of the enrolment and instruction of the new levies.

24 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

The execution of the conscription law was unfortunately re-
sisted for a time by Governor Brown of Georgia. The cor-
respondence between him and the President on the subject,
which was printed and hawked in pamphlet form through the
country, was a curiosity. It was illustrated copiously by Mr.
Brown with citations from the Virginia and Kentucky resolu-
tions of 1798, and exhumed opinions of members' of the old
Federal Convention of 1787. In the most vital periods of the
country's destiny, and in the fierce tumults of a revolution
the people of the South were refreshed with exhumations from
the politicians of 1787, and the usual amount of clap-tra23
about our " forefathers," and the old political system that had
rotted over our heads.

The beneficial efi'ect of the conscription law in the reorgani-
zation of our army was assisted by some other acts of legisla-
tion. That reorganization was advanced by the appointment
of lieutenant-generals, some commanding separate depart-
ments, and others heading army corps under a general in the
field. The policy of organizing the brigades with troops and
generals from the several States was pursued, as opportunities
offered, without detriment to the public service. The greater
satisfaction of the men from each State, when collected to-
gether, the generous emulation for glory to their State, and the
fair apportionment of ofiicers assured to each State according
to its contribution of defenders to the country, overbalanced
the inconvenience of separating regiments or companies pre-
viously associated, and the liability to State jealousies. Mili-
tary courts were organized to secure the prompt administration
of the military law, to check desertion and straggling, to re-
strain license of all kinds, and to advance ten.perance, disci-
pline, and subordination.

But it was not only the reorganization and improved morale
of the army that came to the aid of the declining fortunes of
the South in the war.

The disasters on the Mississippi frontier and in other direc-
tions had constrained the government to adopt the policy ot
concentrating its forces in the interior of Yirginia. The ob
ject of all war is to reach a decisive point of the campaign, and
this object was realized by a policy which it is true the govern-
ment had not adopted at the instance of reason, but which had

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE "WAK. 25

been imposed upon it by the force of disaster. There were
childish complaints that certain districts and points on the fron-
tier had been abandoned by the Confederates for the purpose of
a concentration of troops in Virginia. An inflammatory ap-
peal was made by Governor Rector of Arkansas to the States
of the Jrans-Mississippi, representing that the government had
deserted them in transferring its troops to other portions of the
Confederacy, and suggesting that they should form a new as-
sociation for their safety. But the appeal was severely rebuked
by public sentiment. The complaint of Governor Eector cost
him his election, and the display of the demagogue consigned
him to the reproaches of the public.

Such complaints were alike selfish and senseless, and in
most cases nothing more than the utterances of a demagogical,
short-sighted, and selfish spirit, which would have preferred
the apparent security of its own particular State or section tO'
the fortunes of the whole Confederacy. The fact was, that
there was cause of intelligent congratulation, even in those
districts from which the Confederate troops had been withdrawn
to make a decisive battle, that we had at last reached a crisis,
the decision of which might reverse all our past misfortunes and
achieve results in which every State of the Confederacy would
have a share.

But the first movements of the famous summer campaign in
Virginia that was to change the fortunes of the war and adorn
our arms, were not auspicious. The designs of some of these
movements were not properly appreciated at the time, and
some of the incidents that attended them were real disasters.

We have seen that by the happy boldness of General Ma-
gruder in keeping the enemy in check on the line between
Yorktown, on York river, and Mulberry Island, on James
river, the advance of the grand Federal army, destined for the
capture of Richmond, was stayed until our forces were rescued
by the consummate strategy of Gen. Johnston from the pres-
sure of enveloping armies, who arrived in time to reinforce our
lines on the Peninsula. It became necessary, however, in the
judgment of that commander, to fall back in the direction of
Richmond. It was easily seen by General Johnston that at
Yorktown there was no prospect of a general action, as the
attack on either side would have to be made under disadvan-

26 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE Wx\E.

tages which neither army was willing to risk. The Yankees
were in superior force, besides their additional strength in their
gunboats, and in falling back so as to invest the line of the
Chickahominy, General Johnston expected to force the enemy
to more equal terms. The difficulty was to-match the strength
of the enemy on the water ; and the best practical equivalent
for this was considered to be the open field, where gunboats
being out of the question, the position of our troo]3s would be
the same as if at Yorktown they had had a force of gunboats
exactly equal to that of the enemy, thus neutralizing his ad-
vantage in respect of naval armament.

The retreat from Yorktown produced uneasiness in the pub-
lic mind, and naturally shook the confidence of the many who
were in ignorance of the plans of the cautious and taciturn
strategist at the head of our forces in Virginia. It involved
our surrender of l^orfolk, with all the advantages of its con-
tiguous navy-yard and dock. And it was accompanied by a
disaster which, in so far as it was supposed to be unnecessary
and wanton, occasioned an amount of grief and rage in the
Confederacy such as had not yet been exhibited in the war.

This memorable disaster was the destruction of the famous
mailed steamer Virginia — " the iron diadem of the South."
This vessel, which had obtained for us our first triumph on the
water, was an object of pride, and almost of affection, to the
people of the South. She was popularly said to be worth fifty
thousand troops in the field. Nor was this estimate excessive,
when it is recollected that she protected Norfolk, the navy-
yard, and James river ; that no fleet of transports could safely
land its troops, designed to attack those places, at any point
from Cape Henry to the upper James, as far as she could
.ascend ; that her presence at Norfolk had annihilated the land
and water blockade at Newport News, passed the control of
the James river into our hands, and protected the right flank
of our army on the Peninsula.

The Virginia was destroyed under the immediate orders of
her commander. Commodore Tatnall, on the morning of the
11th of May, in the vicinity of Craney Island. According to
his statement, he had been betrayed into the necessity of de-
stroying his vessel by firing her magazine, by the deceitful
representations of his pilots, who at first assured him that they

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR. 27

could take tlie ship, witli a draft of eig]iteen feet of water,
within forty miles of Richmond, and after having lifted her so
as to unfit her for action, then declared that they could not get
her above the Jamestown flats, up to which point the shore on
each side was occupied by the enemy. It is proper to add,
that this statement of facts was contested by the pilots, who
resented the reflections made upon their loyalty or courage.
"Whatever may have been the merits of this controversy, it is
certain that the vessel was destroyed in great haste by Com-
modore Tatnall, who, in the dead hour of night, aroused
from his slumbers and acquainted with the decision of his
pilots, ordered the ship to be put ashore, landed his crew in tlie
vicinity of Craney Island, and blew to the four winds of heaven
the only naval structui-e that guarded the water approach to
Richmond.

The destruction of the Virginia was a sharp and unexpected
blow to the confidence of the people of the South in their gov-
ernment. How far the government was implicated in tliis
foolish and desperate act, was never openly acknowledged or
exactly ascertained ; but despite the pains of official conceal-
ment, there are certain well-attested facts which indicate that
in the destruction of this great war-ship, the authorities at
Richmond were not guiltless. These facts properly belong to
the history of one of the most unhappy events that had occurred
since the commencem^t of the war.

The Yirginia was destroyed at 5 a. m. of the 11th of May.
During the morning of the same day a prominent politician in
the streets of Richmond was observed to be very much de-
jected ; he remarked that it was an evil day for the Confed-
eracy. On being questioned by his intimate friends, he declared
to them that the Government had determined upon, or assented
to, the destruction of the Virginia, and that he had learned
this from the highest^sources of authority in the capital. At
this time the news ot the explosion of the Virginia could not
have possibly reached Richmond ; there was no telegraphic
communication between the scene of her destruction and the
city, and the evidence appears to be complete, that the Gov-
ernment had at least a prevision of the destruction of this ves-
sel, or had assented to the general policy of the act, trusting,
perhaps, to acquit itself of the responsibility for it on the

28 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE "WAR.

nnwortliy plea that it had given no exjjress orders in the
matter.

Again, it is well known that for at least a week pi'ior to the
destruction of the Yirginia, the evacuation of Norfolk had
been determined upon ; that during tliis time the removal of
stores was daily progressing ; and that Mr. Mallory, the Sec-
retary of the ISTavy, had within this period, himself, visited
Norfolk to look after the public interests. The evacuation of
this port clearly involved the question, what disposition was to
be made of the Yirginia. If the Government made no decision
of a question, which for a week stared it in the face, it cer-
tainly was very strangely neglectful of the public interest.
If Mr. Mallory visited Norfolk when the evacuation was going
on, and never thought of the Yirginia, or thinking of her,
kept dumb, never even giving so much as an official nod as to
what disj)osition should be made of her, he must have been
more stupid than the people who laughed at him in Richmond,
or the members of Congress who nicknamed without mercy
thought him to be.

It is also not a little singular that when a court of inquiry
had found that the destruction of the Yirginia was unnecessary
and improper, Mr. Mallory should have waived the calling oi
a court-martial, forgotten what was due to the public interest
on such a finding as that made by the preliminary co-urt, and
expressed himself satisfied to let the ma^er rest. The fact is
indisputable, that the court-martial, which afterwards sat in
the case, was called at the demand of Commodore Tatuall him-
self. It resulted in his acquittal.

The evacuation of Norfolk was the occasion of great distress
to its population. But it was the part of a wise policy, that our
military lines should be contracted and that the troops of Gen.
Huger should be consolidated with the army before Richmond.

The retreat from Yorktown to the Chick^ominy was marked
by spirited incidents and by one important engagement.
McClellan becoming, through an accident, aware of the move-
ment of General Johnston, immediately pursued our columns,
which recoiled on him at Williamsburg, on the 5th of May,
and drove back his army. During the whole of that day,
General Longstreet's division, which brought up the rear, was
engaged with the enemy from sunrise to sunset. The day was

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 29

marked by signal successes, for we captured three Imndred and
fifty prisoners, took nine pieces of artillery, and left on the
field, in killed and wounded, at least three thousand of the
enemy. During the night our army resumed its movement
towards Richmond, and half an hour after sunrise it had
evaciiated the town, under the necessity of leaving our killed
and wounded in the hands of the enemy.

The following day, the insolence of the enemy was again
checked on the route of our retreat. On the 7tli of May he
attempted a landing, under cover of his gunboats, at Barhams-
ville, near West Point. The attempt was ineifectual. The
Yankees were driven back, after they had assaulted our posi-
tion three different times — the last time being forced to the
cover of their gunboats by the brave Texans of General "Whi-
ting's division, who, in the face of an artillery fire, pressed the
fugitives so closely that many were driven into the river and
drowned.

The investment of the lines of the Chickahominy brought
the two opposing armies within sight of Richmond. After a
desultory military experience, a useless and inglorious march
to Manassas, a long delay on the banks of the Potomac and
Chesapeake, and a vague abandonment of these lines for opera-
tions on the Peninsula, McClellan, who was the " Napoleon"
of the Democratic party of the North, but a slow and con-
temptible blnnderer<fin the estimation of the Republicans,
found himself, by the fortune of circumstances, within sight of
the steeples and spires of the long-sought capital of the Con-
federacy.

The proximity of the enemy was an occasion of great anxi-
ety to the people of Richmond, and the visible tremor of the
Confederate authorities in that city was not a spectacle calcu-
lated either to nerve the army or assure the citizens. The fact
is, that the Confederate authorities had shamefully neglected
the defences of Richmond, and were now making preparations
to leave it, which were called prudential, but which naturally
inspired a panic such as had never before been witnessed in
the history of the war. The destruction of the Virginia had
left the water avenue to Richmond almost undefended. The
City Council had for months been urging upon the Confederate
Government the necessity of obstructing the river, and failing*

30 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR.

to induce tliem to liuny on the work, bad, with patriotic zeal,
undertaken it themselves. A newspaper in Richmond — the
Examiner — had in good time pointed out the necessity o£
obstructing the river with stone, but the counsel was treatea
with such conceit and harshness by the government, that it
was only at the risk of its existence that that paper continued
for weeks to point out the insecurity of Richmond and the
omissions of its authorities. The government was at last
aroused to a sense of danger only to fall to work in ridiculous
haste, and with the blindness of alarm. The appearance of
the Yankee gunboats in James river was the signal for Mr.
Secretary Mallory to show his alacrity in meeting the enemy
by an advertisement for "timber'' to construct new naval
defences. The only obstruction between the city and the
dread Monitor and the gunboats was a half-finished fort at
Drewry's Bluff, which mounted four guns. Some of the Con-
federate ofiicers had taken a " gunboat panic," for the line of
stone obstructions in the river was not yet complete. They
seized upon schooners at the wharves loaded with plaster of
paris, guano, and other valuable cargoes, carried them to points
where they supposed the passage of the river was to be con-
tested, and in some instances sunk them in the wrong places.

There is no doubt that about this time the authorities of the
Confederate States had nigh despaired of the safety of Kich-
mond. The most urgent appeals had been made to Congress
by the press and the people to continue its session in Kich-
mond while the crisis impended. But its members refused to
give this mark of confidence to the government, or to make
iA V any sacrifice of their selfish considerations for the moral

encouragement of their constituents. They had adjourned in
haste and left Richmond, regarding only the safety of their
persons or the convenience of their homes.

Nor was the Executive more determined. In the President's
mansion about this time all was consternation and dismay. A
letter written by one of his family at a time when Richmond
was thought to be imminently threatened, and intercepted by
the enemy, afforded excessive merriment to the Yankees, and
made a painful exhibition to the South of the weakness and
fears of those intrusted with its fortunes. This letter, written
* with refreshing simplicity of heart, overflowed with pitiful

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR. 31

sympathy for the President, and amused the enemy with refer-
ences to the sore anxieties of " Uncle Jeff/' and to the prospect
of his sinking under the misfortunes of his administration.
The authenticity of this letter was never called into question : ,
it is a painful and delicate historical evidence, but one to '
which, in tire interests of truth, allusion shduld not be spared?^],^,^,-*

* The following is a portion of the letter referred i£. The reflections which
it makes upon the courage of our noble, suffering soldiers were probably hasty,
and may be spared here :

. . . " When I think of the datk gloom that now hovers over our
country, I am ready to sink with despair. There is a probability of General
Jackson's army falling back on Richmond, and in view of this, no lady is allowed
to go up on the railroad to Gordonsville for fear, if allowed to one, that many
others would wish to do it, which would incommode the army.

General Johnston is falling back from the Peninsula, or Yorktown, and Uncle
Jeff. Ihi7iks we^had better go to a safe" place than Richmond.

We have not decided yet where we shall go, but I think to North Carolina, to
some far off country town, or, perhaps, to South Carolina. If Johnston falls
back as far as Richmond, all our troops from Gordonsville and " Swift Run Gap"
will also fall back to this place, and make one desperate stand against McClellan.
If you will look at the map, you will see that the Yankees are approaching
Richmond from three different directions — from Fredericksburg, Harrisonburg,
and Yorktown. 0 God ! defend this people with thy powerful arm, is my
constant prayer. Oh, mother. Uncle Jcffi'. is miserable. He tries to be cheerful,
and bear up against such a continuation of troubles, but, oh, I fear he cannot
live long, if he does not get some rest and quiet.

Our reverses distressed him so much, and he is so weak and feeble, it makes
my heart ache to look at him. He knows that he ought to send his wife and
children away, and yet he cannot bear to part with them, and we all dread to
l«ave him too. Varina and I had a hard cry about it to-day.

Oh ! what a blow the fall of New Orleans was. It liked to have set us all
crazy here Everybody looks depressed, and the cause of the Confederacy looks
drooping and sinking ; but if God is with us, who can be against us ? Our troops

are not doing as well as we expected The regiments that

are most apt to run are from North Carolina and Tennessee. I am thankful to
say that the Mississippi and Louisiana troops behave gloriously whenever called
on to fight.

Uncle Jeff, thinks you are safe at home, as there will be no resistance at Viclcsburg,
and the Yankees will hardly occupy it ; and, even if they did, the army would
gain nothing by marching into the country, and a few soldiers would be afraid
to go so far into the interior.

P. S. We all leave here to-morrow morning for Raleigh. Three gunboats
are iu James river, on their way to the city, and may probably reach here in a
few hours ; so we have no longer any time to delay. / only hope that ice have not
delayed too long already. I shall then be cut off from all communication with
, and I expect to have no longer any peace.

I will write again from Rtileigh, and Fanny must write me a letter and direct
it to Pialeigh ; perhaps I may get it. I am afraid that Richmond will fall into

32 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

It is true that President Davis, when invited by the Legisla-
ture of Virginia to express his intentions towards Richmond,
had declared that he entertained the prospect of holding it.
But his reply was full of embarrassment. While he declared
his intention not to surrender the city, he at the same time
suggested the fanciful possibility, that even with the loss of
Richmond our struggle for independence might be protracted
for many years in the mountains of Yirginia. In tlie mean
time, the acts of*the Confederate officials gave visible and
unmistakable signs of their sense of the insecurity of the
capital. They added to the public alarm by preparations to
remove the archives. They ran off their wives and children
into the country. They gave the public every reason to
believe that Richmond was to become the prey of the enemy,
and the catastrophe was awaited with lively alarm, or dull and
melancholy expectation.

In the early weeks of May the capital of the Confederacy
presented many strange and humiliating spectacles. The air
was filled with those rumors of treason and disloyalty which
seem invariably to grow out of a sense of insecurity. Men
who had been loudest in their professions of resistance and
self-devotion when the Yankees were at a distance, were now
engaged in secreting their property, and a few openly flattered
themselves that they had not committed themselves in the war
in a way to incur the enemy's resentment. Some of them had
their cellars packed with manufactured tobacco. The railroad
trains were crowded with refugees. At every extortioner's
shop on Main street, even including the bookstores, an array
of packing trunks invited attention, and suggested the necessity
of flight from Richmond. At the railroad depots were to be
seen piles of baggage, awaiting transportation. But the most
abundant and humiliating signs of the panic were to be seen

the hands of the enemy, as there is no way to keep back the gunboats. James
river is so high that all obstructions fft'e in danger of being washed away ; so
that there is no help for the city. She will either submit or else be shelled, and
I think the latter alternative will be resorted to.

Uncle Jeff, was confirmed last Tuesday in St. Paul's Church by Bishop Johns.
He was baptized at home in the morning before church.

Do try to get a letter to me some way. Direct some to Kaleigh and some to
Richmond. Yours, ever devotedly,

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 33

in the number of pine boxes about tlie departments ticketed
" Columbia, South Carolina," and which contained the most
valuable of the public archives.

In this condition of the public mind, a new appeal was ma3e
to it. "When it was ascertained that the Monitor, Galena, and
Aristook, were about to head for Richmond, the Legislature of
Virginia passed resolutions calling upon the Confederate
authorities to defend it to the last extremity, and to make
choice of its destruction rather than that of surrender to the
enemy. This resolution was worthy of the noble State of Yir-
ginia, and of a people who were the descendants of Wash-
ington's contemporaries, of Hampden's friends, and of King
John's barons. Its terms were too explicit to admit of any
doubt in their construction, or any wavering on the part of the
Confederate authorities. They expressed the desire that Rich-
mond should be defended to the last extremity, and declared
that " the President be assured, that whatever destruction or
loss of property of the State or individuals shall thereby result,
will be cheerfully submitted to."

The resolutions of the Legislature were responded to in
meetings of citizens. The magical effects of the spirit which
they created will long be remembered in Richmond. The
Confederate authorities were stimulated by the brave lesson ;
inert and speculative patriotism was aroused to exertion ;
mutual inspiration of courage and devotion passed from heart
to heart through the community, and with the restoration of
public confidence, came at last vigorous preparations. The
James was rapidly filled up, the works at Drewry's Bluff were
strengthened, and a steady defiance offered to the Yankee gun-
boats, which had appeared within a few miles of the city at a
moment when the last gap in our river obstructions was filled
up by a scuttled schooner.

On the 15th of May, the fleet of Yankee gunboats in the
James opened an attack on our batteries at Drewry's Bluff.
The sound of the guns was heard in the streets of Richmond,
and various and uncertain reports of the fortunes of the contest
agitated the public. In the midst of the excitement, an extra-
ordinary scene occurred in the city. A meeting of citizens
had been called at the City Hall on an accidental occasion,
and at the enthusiastic call of the crowd, impromptu addresses

8

34 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAK,

were made by tlie Governor of Yirginia and the Mayor of the
city. Each of these officials pledged his faith that Rich-
mond should never be surrendered. Gov. Letcher declared,
with a peculiar warmth of expression, that if the demand was
made U})on him, with the alternative to surrender or be shelled,

he should reply, "bombard and be d d." Mayor Mayo

was not less determined in the language which he addressed to
the citizens. He told them that even if they were to require
him to surrender the Capital of Yirginia and of the Confed-
eracy, he would, sooner than comply, resign the mayoralty;
and that, despite his age, he still had the nerve and strength
to shoulder a musket in defence of the city founded by one of
his ancestors. These fervid declarations were responded to by
the citizens with wild and ringing shouts. Nor were these the
demonstrations of a mob. Among those who so enthusias-
tically approved the resolution of consigning Richmond to the
flames rather than to the j)ossession of the enemy, were some
of the most wealthy and respectable citizens of the place,
whose stakes of property in the city were large, and whose
beautiful homes were exjjosed to the shot and shell of the
malignant foe. ,

The night brought the news of a signal victory. Our batter-
ies, under the skilful command of Capt. Farrand, had, after a
contest of four hours and a half, given a decisive repulse to
the 'gunboats, with the inconsiderable loss of five killed and
seven wounded. The accuracy of our fire had astonished the
enemy, and carried dismay through his fleet. Eighteen shots
went through the sides of the Galena, according to the enemy's
own account ; and this river monster lost thirty of her crew in
killed and wounded. Seventeen men were killed on another
of the boats by the explosion of a gun. The boats had been
unable to advance in the face of the accurate and deadly fire
of our artillei'ists, and the next day they had dropped down
the sti'eam, quite satisfied of the impracticability of the water
approach to Richmond.

Regarding all the circumstances in which this action had
taken place, there is no extravagance in saying, that the scale
of the war was turned in our favor by even so small an affair
as that of Drewry's Bluff. It exploded the fanciful theories
of the enemy's invincibility on the water, and went far to

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 35 .

assure the safety of the now closely threatened capital of the
Confederacy.

But there were other causes about this time which conspired
to renew the popular confidence in our arms, and to swell witli
gratitude and hope the hearts which had so long throbbed
with anxiety in our besieged capital. We shall see how, for
some time, at least, the safety of Richmond was trusted, not
so much to the fortunes of the forces that immediately pro-
tected it, as to the splendid diversion of the heroic Jackson in
the Yalley of Virginia. To this famous expedition public
attention was now turned, in the I^orth as well as in the South,
and its almost marvellous results, with marked unanimity,
were ascribed to the zeal, heroism, and genius of its commander
alone.

Jackson's campaign in the valley.

On the change of our military lines in Yirginia, and the
rapid shifting of the scene of active hostilities from the Poto-
mac, Gen. Jackson had been assigned with a small force to
guard the Valley of Virginia, and the approaches in that
direction, to the armies of the enemy which enveloped Rich-
mond.

Our first success was obtained in the upper portion of the
Valley. On the morning of the 8th of May, our forces had
approached the position of Milroy, the Yankee commander at
McDowell. The brigade of General Johnson had secured an
advantageous position on a hill, and the enemy, fearful of
being surrounded, decided at last, after some signs of hesita-
tion, to deliver battle. The action was not joined until about
two hours of sunset. The fact was, that we engaged the enemy
with not more than one-third of his own numbers, which were
about twelve thousand. But the contest was easily decided
by the brave troops of Johnson's brigade, composed of Yir-
ginia volunteers, with the 12th Georgia regiment. They had
stood for nearly two hours, receiving with composed courage
the cross-fire of the enemy's artillery; and then, as the sun
was sinking, they made the charge decisive of the day, and
drove the enemy in consternation and utter rout from the field.

Our loss in this action was considerable. Of three hundred
and fifty killed and wounded, nearly two-thirds were Georgians.

36 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

The troops of this State on otlier occasions than this had left
monuments of their courage in the mountains of Virginia.
The loss of the enemy at McDowell exceeded that of the Con-
federates, and was conjectured to be double our own.

It was probably at the suggestion of his own judgment, and
at the instance of his own military instincts, that Gen. Jackson
determined to act on the aggressive, and to essay the extraor-
dinary task of driving the Yankees from the Yalley. In pur-
suance of this determination, his resolution was quickly taken
to make a dash at Fremont's advance, west of Staunton, and
then to turn upon Banks with the adventurous purpose of
driving him into Maryland.

Gen. Banks, one of the military pets of the more truculent
party of the abolitionists, had entered Yirginia with the airs
of a conqueror. As early as the 24:th of April he had tele-
graphed to his government the story of uninterrupted and
triumphant progress ; he announced that he had " advanced
near Harrisonburg;" and, with a characteristic flourish, he
added : " The rebel Jackson has abandoned the Yalley of Yir-
ginia permanently, and is en route for Gordonsville by the way
of the mountains."

The first intimation the obtuse Yankee general had of his
mistake was the astounding news that reached him on the
evening of May 23d, that the "rebel Jackson" had descended
on the guard at Front Royal, Col. Kenly, 1st Maryland regi-
ment, commanding, burned the bridges, driven the Federal
troops towards Strasburg with great loss, captured a section of
artillery, and taken about fourteen hundred prisoners.

It was now Banks's turn to betake himself to flight, or, in
,the oflicial circumlocution of that commander, " to enter the
lists with the enemy in a race or a battle, as he should choose,
for the possession of Wiiwjhester, the key of the Yalley." But
he was not destined to reach his promised haven of security
without disaster.

On the day following the sudden apparition of Jackson at
Front Boyal, the untiring commander had by a rapid move-
ment succeeded in piercing Banks's main column M-hile retreat
ing from Strasburg to Winchester; the rear, including a body
of the celebrated Zouaves d'Afrique, retreating towards Stras-
burg.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 37

♦

The Yankee general reached Winchester only to find fresh
causes of alarm. The people of that ancient town, already
sure of their deliverance, received the Yankees with shouts of
derision and defiant cheers for Jackson. Some Confederate
officers came into the enemy's camp with entire unconcern,
supposing that their own troops occupied the town as a matter
of course, and when captured gave the Yankees the delightful
assurance that an attack would be made by the terrible Jackson
at daybreak.

On the 25th of May, Gen. Jackson gave the crowning stroke
to the rapid movements of the past two days by attacking
"Winchester and driving out the cowardly enemy almost without
resistance. Gen. Banks speaks of his retreat with a shameless-
ness that is at once simple and refreshing. He says, " Pursuit
by the enemy was prompt and vigorous ; but our movements
were rapid ;" and he writes to the authorities at Washington
of his crossing of the Potomac : " There never were more
grateful hearts in the same number of men than when at mid-
day on the 30th of May, we stood on the opposite shore." lie
had escaped with the loss of all the material and paraphernalia
that constitute an army. He had abandoned at Winchester
all his commissary and ordnance stores. He had resigned
that town and Front Royal to the undisputed possession of the
Confederates. He had left in their hands four thousand
prisoners, and stores amounting to millions of dollars. And
all these prizes had been obtained by the Confederates in the
brief period of a few days, and with a loss not exceeding one
hundred in killed and wounded.

When General Jackson fell back from Winchester, after
routing Banks, he managed, with great address, boldness, and
energy, to carry off his prisoners and spoils, and to bring off
, his army between the converging columns of Fremont, who
approached his rear from the west, with eight brigades, and
Shields, who approached from the east, with four brigades.
If these brigades averaged twenty -five hundred men, the force
of Fremont was twenty thousand and that of Shields ten
thousand men. At Harrisonburg, Jackson left the main turn-
pike-road of the Valley and marched towards Port Eepublic,
the distance between these two places being about twelve miles.
Port Eepublic is situated at the junction of South river, flow-

38 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

ing north, and North river, flowing east. Jackson could retire
no further without crossing North river, which was swollen,
and there was then no bridge over it except at Port Republic.
The two rivers uniting at that village form the Shenandoah,
which flows north, and which could not then be crossed by an
army. On the east side of that stream was the army of Shields,
and on the west side were the armies of Fremont and Jackson.
The latter halted near North river without crossing it, and,
while in that position, his rear was approached and attacked
by Fremont's whole army, on the morning of Sunday, the 8th
of June, and, at the same time. Shields' force approached on
the east side of the Shenandoah near Port Republic.

That part of Jackson's arm}^ which engaged Fremont on
Sunday was commanded by General Ewell, while the rest of
the army under General Jackson held Shields in check with
artillery firing across the Shenandoah near Port Republic.
The battle of Sunday took place about five miles from that
village in the direction of Harrisonburg.

It began early in the morning and lasted all day, with occa-
sional intervals. It was mainly an artillery fight, but now and
then, here and there, the infantry became hotly engaged.
The force under Fremont was much larger than that under
Ewell, but the latter was strongly posted on eminences which
favored the effectiveness of artillery, and sheltered the infantry,
while the enemy could only approacli through open fields.
Ewell's command was handled with remarkable skill, while
Fremont's generalship was indifferent. Ewell's artillery was
served with admirable precision and effect, and his infantry,
whenever engaged, displayed^ great steadiness and gallantry.
The result was, that when night put an end to the contest,
Fremont had been driven back between one and two miles, with
a loss, in killed and wounded, of not less than two thousand,
and probably much larger, while our loss did not exceed three
hundred, and probably not two hundred. The judicious selec-
tion of a position in which to receive the en^my favored this
result, but it was largely due to the superior fighting qualities
of our men.

Soon after nightfall, General Jackson began to withdraw
his men from this battle-field, and pass them over North river
by the bridge at Port Republic, with a view to attack Shields

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 39

• the next morning. He left in front of Fremont a small force
to amuse and detain him, and, after retiring before him t(t Port
Republic, to burn the bridge behind him, and thus to prevent
Fremont from rendering any aid to Shields. All this was ao
complished.

>> On Monday morning, Jackson passed the greater part of
his army across the South river (the smallest of the streams)
by means of a bridge made of planks laid on wagons placed
in the river. Early in the morning a sufficient number had
crossed to commence the battle, and they were led to the field
between one and two miles distant, on the east bank of the
Shenandoah. The enemy's force was found drawn up await-
ing the attack.

The enemy's line extended from the river about half a mile
across a flat bottom, free from timber, and covered with wheat,
grass, &c. His left rested on the point of a low ridge coming
out from the woods which skirt the bottom. On a slight ele-
vation there and in some small knolls in the bottom, he had his
artillery commanding the road and the wide uncovered level
plain, over which Jackson's army was obliged to advance. The
level and exposed ground offered scarcely any suitable position
for planting our artillery. The advantage of position belonged
altogether to the enemy. The capital fault of his disposition
for battle was that the battery on his extreme left was posted
near the woods without any infantry in the woods to defend it.
By availing himself of this circumstance, and by a brilliant
manoeuvre and charge, Jackson turned the fortune of the day
at a critical moment.

For some two hours the battle raged with great fury. Our
infantry, at first but few, advanced with marvellous intrepidity
in the face of a withering fire of artillery and musketry. At
one moment the enemy advanced a section of a battery several
hundred yards, so as to enfilade our left wing, which already-
suffered terribly from tlie fire in front. It seemed that nothing
could withstand the fury of the enemy's fire of all arms. His
artillery was very fine, and was served with great effect by
regulars. But other troops coming at double quick from For
Republic, came on the field, and, at the same time, the Louisi-
ana brigade, under Taylor, emerged from the woods on the
enemy's left. They had been sent by a considerable circuit

4:0 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE -WAR.

tlirongli the woods, which extend all along the battle-field be-
tween the cleared ground and tlie neighboring mountain. By
a slight error of direction they came out of the woods a little
too soon, and found themselves almost in front of the battery,
which instantly began to shower grape upon them. But, im-
mediately rectifying their direction, they charged the battery
with irresistible impetuosity, and carried it. The contest then
was speedily ended. The enemy's whole line gave way and
was presently retreating in disorder, pursued by our cavalry.
The pursuit was kept up about ten or twelve miles, but the
flight continued all that day and the next. About five hun-
dred prisoners were taken that day, and others after tliat were
brought in daily. The loss of the enemy in killed and wounded
was heavy, and so was our own. Six splendid cannon were
captured on the field, another was taken in the pursuit, and
still another had been captured on Sunday. The force of the
enemy engaged was about six or seven thousand, and ours a
little larger. Shields was not present, but his troops were com-
manded by Gen. Tyler.

After the rout of the enemy had commenced, the last of our
troops crossed over the bridge at Port Republic and burnt it.
Fremont, cautiously following, appeared some time afterwards,
and drew up his army in line of battle on the heights along
the west bank of the Shenandoah, from which he overlooked
the field of battle. While he stood there in impotent idleness,
Jackson's army, having finally disposed of Shields, moved off
at leisure to Brown's Gap, and there encamped, to rest for a
few days from the fatigues of a month's campaign more ardu-
ous and more successful than any month's operations of the
war. The exhaustion of our men and the interposition of a
river, no longer bridged, secured Fremont from a second bat-
tle or a hasty flight. Tlie next day he commenced his retreat
down the Valley. ^«-

Tins famous campaign must, indeed, take a rank in the his-
tory of the war, unrivalled by any other in the rapidity of its
movements and in the brilliancy of the results accomplished,
compared with the means at its command. Its heroic deeda
revived the hopes of the South, and threw the splendor of sun-
light over the long lines of the Confederate host. By a series
of rapid movements, which occupied but a few weeks. General

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAK. 41

Jackson had, with inferior numbers, defeated successively four
generals, with as many armies, swept the Yalley of Virginia of
hostile forces, made the Federal authorities tremble in their
capital, and frustrated the combinations by which the enemy
had purposed to aid General McClellan and environ Richmond
by large converging armies.

Our loss of life in this campaign was inconsiderable in num-
bers ; but on the black list of killed, there was one name con-
spicuous throughout the Confederacy, and especially dear to
Virginians, Colonel Turner Ashby, whose name was linked
with so much of the romance of the war, and whose gentle and
enthusiastic courage and knightly bearing had called to mind
the recollections of chivalry, and adorned Virginia with a new
chaplet of fame, had, on the 5th of June, fallen in a skirmish
near Harrisburg.

" The last time I saw Ashby," writes a noble comrade in
arms. Colonel Bradley T. Johnson of the Maryland Line, " he
was riding at the head of the column with General Ewell — his
black face in a blaze of enthusiasm. Every feature beamed
with the joy of the soldier. He was gesticulating and pointing
out the country and positions to General Ewell. I could im
agine what he was saying by the motions of his right arm. I
pointed him out to my adjutant. ' Look a! Ashby ; see how he
is enjoying himself.' "

A few hours later, and the brave Virginian, so full of life,
was a corpse. Our men had fallen upon a body of the enemy
concealed in a piece of woods and under the cover of a fence.
Ashby was on the right of the 58th Virginia. He implored
the men to stop their fire, which was inefi'ectual, and to charge
the enemy. They were too much excited to heed him, and
turning towards the enemy he waved his hand — " Virginians,
charge!" In a second his horse fell. He was on his feet in an
instant. "Men," he cried, "cease firing — charge, for God's
sake, charge !" The next instant he fell dead — not twenty
yards from the concealed marksman who had killed him.

To the sketch we have briefly given of this campaign, it is
just to add one word of reflection. It had been fi-equeutly and
very unwarrantably asserted that the people of what was once
the garden spot of the South, the Shenandoah Valley, were
favorably inclined to the Union cause, and that many of them

42 THE SECOND TEAE. OF THE WAR.

had shown a very decided spirit of disloyalty to the Confed-
erate authority. The hest refutation of this slander is to be
found in the enemy's own accounts of his experiences in that
region.

The fact is, that the people of this Yalley had suffered to a
most extraordinary degree the fiery trials and ravages of war.
Their country had been bandied about from the possession of
the Confederates to that of the Yankees, and then back again,
until it had been stripped of every thing by needy friends on
the one side, and unscrupulous invaders on the other. Some
portions of the country were actually overrun by three armies
in two weeks. In such circumstances there were, no doubt,
expressions of discontent, which had been hastily misinter-
preted as disloyal demonstrations ; but, despite these, there is
just reason to believe that a spirit of patriotism and integrity
abided in the Yalley of Yirginia, and that it had been main-
tained under tibials and chastisements much greater than those
which had befallen other parts of the Confederacy.

MEMOIR OF TUENER ASHBY.

The writer had proposed a record in another and more ex-
tensive form of the principal events of the life of Turner
Asliby ; but the disappointment of assistance to sources of
information from persons who had represented themselves as
the friends of the deceased, and from whom the writer had
reason to expect willing and warm co-operation, has com-
pelled him to defer the execution of his original and cherished
purpose of giving to the public a worthy biography of one
whose name is a source of immortal pride to the South, and an
enduring ornament to the chivalry of Yirginia. But the few
incidents roughly thrown together here may have a certain
interest. They give the key to the character of one of the
most remarkable men of the war ; they afford an example to
be emulated by our soldiers ; they represent a type of courage
peculiarly Southern in its aspects ; and they add an unfading
leaf to the chaplet of glory which Yirginia has gathered on
the blood-stained fields of the war.

It is not improper here to state the weight and significance

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR. 43

given to the present revolution by the secession of Virginia.
It takes time for revolutions to acquire their meaning and
proper significance. That which was commenced by the Cot-
ton States of the South, attained its growth, developed its
purpose, and became instantly and thoroughly in earnest at
the period when the second secessionary moveme7it, inaugurated
by Yirginia, confronted the powers at Washington with its
sublime spectacles.

Virginia did not secede in either the circumstances or sense in
which the Cotton States had separated themselves from the
Union. She did not leave the Union with delusive prospects of
peace to comfort or sustain her. She did not secede in the sense
in which separation from the Union was the primary object of
secession. Her act of secession was subordinate ; she was called
upon to oppose a practical and overt usurpation on the part of
the Government at Washington in drawing its sword against the
sovereignty of States and insisting on the right of coercion ; to
contest this her separation from the Union was necessar}-, and
became a painful formality which could not be dispensed with.

A just and philosophical observation of events must find that
in this second secessionary movement of the Southern States,
the revolution was put on a basis infinitely higher and firmer
in all its moral and constitutional aspects ; that at this period
it developed itself, acquired its proper significance, and was
broadly translated into a war of liberty. The movement of
Virginia had more than any thing else added to the moral
influences of the revolution and perfected its justification in the
eyes of the world. It was plain that she had not seceded on
an issue of policy, but one of distinct and practical constitu-
tional right, and that, too, in the face of a war which frowned
upon her own borders, and which necessarily was to make her
soil the principal theatre of its ravages and woes. Her attach-
ment to the Union had been proved by the most untiring and
noble efiforts to save it ; her Legislature originated the Peace
Conference, which assembled at Washington in February,
1861; her representatives in Congress sought in that body
every mode of honorable pacification ; her Convention sent
delegates to Washington to persuade Mr. Lincoln to a pacific
policy ; and in every form of public assembly, every expedient
of negotiation was essayed to save the Union. When these

44: THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR.

efforts at pacification, wliicli Virginia had made with an unsel-
fishness M'ithout parallel, and with a nobility of spirit that
scorned any misrepresentation of her office, proved abortive,
she did not hesitate to draw her sword in front of the enemy,
and to devote all she possessed and loved and hoped for to the
fortunes of the war. It is not necessary to recount at length the
services of this ancient Commonwealth in the war for Southern
independence. She furnished nearly all of the arms, ammuni-
tion, and accoutrements that won the early battles ; she gave
the Confederate service, from her own armories and stores,
seventy-five thousand rifles and muskets, nearly three hundred
pieces of artillery, and a magnificent armory, containing all
the machinery necessary for manufacturing arms on a large
scale ; and on eveiy occasion she replied to the call for troops,
until she drained her arms-bearing population to the dregs.

It is a circumstance of most honorable remark, that such has
been the conduct of Yirginia in this war, that even from the
base and vindictive enemy tributes have been forced to the de-
voted courage and heroic qualities of her sons. The following
extraordinary tribute from the "Washington Repuhlioan^ the
organ of abolition at the Yankee capital, is a compliment more
expressive than any thing a Virginian could say for his own
State and its present generation of heroes.

" If there has been any decadence of the manly virtues in
the Old Dominion, it is not because the present generation has
proved itself either weak or cowardly or unequal to the greatest
emers:encies. No people, with so few numbers, ever put into
the field, and kept there so long, troops more numerous, brave,
or more efficient, or produced generals of more merit, in all the
kinds and gi-ades of military talent. It is not a worn-out, efi'ete
race which has produced Lee, Johnston, Jackson, Ashby, and
Stuart. It is not a worn-out and effete race, which, for two
years, has defended its capital against the approach of an en-
emy close upon their borders, and outnumbering them thirty
to one. It is not a worn-out and effete race which has pre-
served substantial popular unity under all the straits and
pressure and sacrifices of this unprecedented war. ' Let his-
tory,' as was said of another race, ' which records their unhappy
fate as a people, do justice to their rude virtues as men.' They
are fighting madly in a bad cause, but they are fighting bravely.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAK. 45

They have few cowards and no traitors. The hardships of war
are endured withont a mnrmur by all classes, and the dangers
of war withont flinching, by the newest conscripts ; while their
gentry, the offshoot of their popular social system, have thrown
themselves into the camp and field with all the dash and high
spirit of the European noblesse of the middle ages, risking,
without apparent concern, upon a desperate adventure, all that
men value ; and after a generation of peace and repose and
security, which had not emasculated them, presenting to their
enemies a trained and intrepid front, as of men born and bred
to war."

What has been said here of Virginia and her characteristics
in the present revolution, is the natural and just preface to
what we have to say of the man who, more than any one else
in this war, illustrated the chivalry of the Commonwealth and
the virtues of her gentry. Turner Ashby was a thorough Yir-
ginian. He was an ardent lover of the old Union. He was
brought up in that conservative and respectable school of poli-
tics which hesitated long to sacrifice a Union which had been,,
in part, constructed by the most illustrious of the sons of
Virginia ; which had conferred many honors upon her ; and
which was the subject of many hopes in the future. But when
it became evident that the life of the Union was gone, and the
sword was drawn for constitutional liberty, the spirit of Vir-
ginia was again illustrated byf^shby, who showed a devotion
in the field even more admirable than the virtue of political
principles.

Turner Ashby was the second son of the late Colonel Turner
Ashby, of " Eose Bank," Fauquier county, and Dorothea F.
Green, the daughter of the late James Green, Sr., of Eappa-
hannock county. Colonel Ashby, at his death, left three sons
and three daughters — the eldest of whom did not exceed twelve
years of age at the time of his death — to the sole care of their
devoted mother. To her excellent sense, generous disposition,
and noble character, the Confederacy is indebted for two as
noble and gallant men as have won soldiers' graves during
this war.

The father of Turner Ashby was the sixth son, that reached
manhood, of Captain Jack Ashby, a man of mark in the day
in which he lived, and of whom many anecdotes are still

46 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

extant, illustrative of his remarkable character. One of these
belongs to the colonial times, and is interesting :

" When the news of the disastrous defeat and death of
General Braddock reached Fort Loudoun (now Winchester,
Virginia), John Ashby was there, and his celebrity as a horse-
man induced the British commandant of the post to secure
his services as bearer of dispatches to the vice-royal governor
at Williamsburg. Ashby at once proceeded on his mission,
and in an incredibly short time presented himself before the
commander at Fort Loudoun. This official, of choleric dispo-
sition, upon the appearance of Ashby, broke out in severe
reproach for his delay in proceeding on his mission, and was
finally struck dumb with astonishment at the presentation of
the governor's reply to the dispatch ! The ride is said to have
been accomplished in the shortest possible time, and the fact
is certified in the records of Frederick county court.''

Upon the breaking out of the Revolution of 1776, Captain
Jack Ashby raised a company in his neighborhood in the
upper part of Fauquier. It was attached to the third Virginia
regiment, under command of General Marshall. He was in
the battles of Brandywine, Germantown, and several other of
the most desperately contested fields of the Revolution, From
exposure and hardships endured upon the frontiers of Canada,
he contracted disease, from which he was never entirely relieved
to the day of his death. He *continued in the service during
the whole period of the Revolution, and after the proclama-
tion of peace, quietly settled upon his beautiful farm not far
from Markham station, upon the Manassas Gap railroad.
Four of his sons, John, Samuel, Nimrod, and Thomson, served
in the war of 1812.

The father of our hero died, as we have stated, leaving a
family of children of tender age. Young Turner was put to
school, where it does not appear that he showed any peculiar
trait in his studies ; but he was remarkable among his young
associates for his sedate manners, his grave regard for truth,
and his appreciation of points of honor.

Turner Ashby never had the advantages of a college educa-
tion, but he had a good, healthy mind ; he was an attentive
student of human nature, and a convenient listener where
information was to be gained ; and he possessed those ordinaiy

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. " 47

stores of knowledge which may be acquired by a moderate use of
books and an attentive intercourse with men. He was engaged
for some time in merchandise at Markham's Depot. The old
homestead of his father still stands near there, and not far from
the homestead of the Marshalls. The tastes of Ashby were
too domestic for politics. He Avas at one time Whig candidate
for the Yirginia Legislature from Fauquier, but was defeated
by a small majority. This was his only public appearance in
any political strife, and but little else is known of hira as a
politician beyond his ardent admiration of and personal attach-
ment to Robert E. Scott.

Ashby's attachment to domestic life was enlivened by an
extreme fondness for manly pastimes. He was a horseman
from very childhood, and had the greatest passion for eques-
trian exercises. His delight in physical excitements was
singularly pure and virtuous ; he shunned the dissipations
fashionable among young men, and while so sober and steady
in his habits as sometimes to be a joke among his companions,
yet he was the foremost in all innocent sports, the first to get up
tournaments and fox-chases, and almost always the successful
competitor in all manly games. His favorite horse was trained
for tournaments and fox-hunting, and it is said to have been a
common pastime of 'Ashby to take him into the meadow and
jump him over hay-cocks and stone fences. Some of his feats
of horsemanship are memorable, and are constantly related in
his ndghborhood. While at Fauquier Springs, which he fre-
quently visited, and where he got up tournaments after the
fashion of the ancient chivalry, he once displayed his horse-
manship by riding into the ball-room, up and down steep
flights of steps, to the mingled terror and admiration of the
guests. No cavalier was more graceful. The reserve of his
manner was thrown aside in such sports, and his black eyes
and dark face w^ere lighted up with the zeal of competition or
the excitement of danger.

The gravity so perceptible at times in Ashby's manner was
not the sign of a melancholy or blank mind. He was too prac-
tical for reveries ; he w^as rather a man of deep feelings.
While he scorned the vulgar and shallow ambition that seeks
for notoriety, he probably had that ideal and aspiration which
silent men often have, and which, if called " ambition" at all,

48 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAR.

is to be characterized as the nohle and spiritual ambition that
wins the honors of history, while others contend for the baubles
of the populace.

" He was," writes a lady of his neighborhood, " a person of
very deep feelings, wliich would not have been apparent to
strangers, from his natural reserve of manner; but there was
no act of friendship or kindness he would have shrunk to per-
form, if called on. "While he was not a professor of religion,
there was always a peculiar regard for the precepts of the
Bible, wliich showed itself in his irreproachable walk in life.
Often have I known him to open the Sabbath school at the re-
quest of his lady friends, in a little church near his home, by
reading a prayer and a chapter in the Bible. Turner Ashby
seldom left his native neighborhood, so strong were his local
attaclmients, and would not have done so, save at his country's
call."

That call was sounded sooner than Ashby expected. At the
first prelude to the bloody drama of the war — the John Brown
raid — he had been conspicuous, and his company of horse,
then called " The Mountain Rangers," did service on that oc-
casion. He appeared to have felt and known the consequences
which were to ensue from this frightful crusade. Thencefor-
ward his physical and intellectual power^ were directed to the
coming struggle. On the occasion of the irruption of John
Brown and his felon band at Harper's Ferry, he remarked to
Mr. Boteler, the member of Congress from that district^that a
crisis was approaching, and that the South would be continu-
ally subject to such inroads and insults, unless some prevention
was quickly effected. He continued, however, a strong Union
man until the electioa of Lincoln : he was anxions that har-
mony should be effected between the States, and the legacies
of the past should be preserved in a constitutional and frater-
nal Union; but this hope was instantly dispelled by the result
of the election ; and as soon as it was announced, he went
quietly and energetically to work, drilling his men, promoting
their efficiency, and preparing for that great trial of arms
which he saw rapidly approaching.

The next time that Mr. Boteler met Ashby at Harper's Ferry,
was on the night of the 17th of April, 1861. Mr. Boteler took
him aside, and said to him, " What flag are we going to fight

THE SECOND TEAE OF THE WAR. 49

under — the Palmetto, or what?" Ashby lifted his hat, and
within it was laid a Yirginia flag. He had had it painted at
midnight, before he left Richmond. " Here," said he, " is the
flag I intend to fight under." That night the flag was run up
by the light of the burning buildings fired by the Yankees,
and the next morning the glorious emblem of the Old Domin-
ion was seen floating from the Federal flag-stafi" — the first
ensign of liberty raised by Yirginia in this war.

It was not long after the arrival of Capt. Ashby at Harper's
Ferry, with his cavalry, that he was placed in command at
Point of Rocks, by Gen. Johnston, supported by Capt. R.
Welby Carter's company of cavalry and Capt. John Q. Win-
field's infantry corps of " Brock's Gap Riflemen."

About the same time Col. Angus W. McDonald, senior, of
Winchester, Yirginia, was commissioned to raise a legion of
mounted men for border service, the lieutenant-colonelcy of
which was at once tendered to Capt. Ashby. Without final
acceptance of this position, he, with his command, entered the
legion, the organization of which was soon accomplished.

The original captains were Ashby, Winfield, S. W. Myers
Mason, Shands, Jordan, Miller, Harper, and Sheetz.

This force was assembled at Romney, Hampshire county, very
soon after the evacuation of Harper's Ferry by Gen. Johnston.

The difficulty which existed as to Capt. Ashby's acceptance
of the lieutenant-colonelcy of the legion, consisted in the fact
that he felt under special obligations to his company, who were
unwilling to dispense with his personal command. The arrival
of his brother, Richard Ashby, from Texas, who joined the
company as an independent volunteer, appeared to open the
way of relieving this difficulty, as the company was prepared
to accept in him a captain, in order to secure the promotion of
their beloved leader.

But a melancholy providence was to occur at this time,
which was to color the life of Turner Ashby, and afifect it more
deeply than any thing he had yet experienced. The county
of Hampshire had already been invaded by the enemy, and
Colonel, now Major-general, A. P. Hill had already visited the
county with several regiments of infantry, in order to repel the
invader. This county was also chosen for the labor of the
mounted legion.

60 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

It was shortly after the organization of the command, and
its active duty entered upon, that Capt. Ashbj led a detach-
ment to Green Spring station, on the Baltimore and Ohio rail-
road, for the purpose of observation. He had with him eleven
men, and his brother Richard led another small band of six.
The latter was proceeding along the railroad westward, in the
direction of Cumberland — some ten miles away — when he was
ambuscaded at the mouth of a ravine just beside the railroad
there, running just between the river bank and the steep moun-
tain side. The enemy's force consisted of about eighteen men,
commanded by Corporal Hays, of the Indiana Zouave regi-
ment, which was stationed at Cumberland. His men, at
length compelled to fall back before superior numbers, hasten-
ed down the railroad to rejoin Turner Ashby. Covering their
retreat himself, he hastened to the rescue of one of his men,
severely wounded in the face by a sabre stroke, and in a hand
to hand fight with Corporal Hays, severely wounded him in
the head with his sabre. Following immediately his retreating
companions, the horse which he rode proved false, and fell into
a cattle-stop of the railroad with his unfortunate rider. H
was overtaken, beaten, bruised, wounded, and left for dead.
He was removed many hours afterwards, and lived for several
days, enjoying every kind attention, but his wounds proved
mortal. He was buried in the beautiful Indian Mound Ceme-
tery at Romney, on the 4th of July, 1861.

During the engagement of his brother. Turner Ashby started
up the railroad to his rescue ; but in passing along the river's
brink, his force was fired upon from Kelly's Island, on the
north branch of the Potomac, about twelve miles east of Cum-
berland. The island lies some sixty feet from the Yirginia
bank, which is precipitous, and directly laid with the railroad
track. On the other side of the island, which was reached
through water to the saddle girth, there is a gently rising
beach, some thirty yards to the interior, which is thickly
wooded, and contains a dense undergrowth. Here in ambush
lay, as was afterwards reported, about forty of the Indiana
troops, and about sixty of Merley's branch riflemen — Maryland
Union men .of the vicinity — woodmen, skilled with the rifle,
and many of them desperate characters. After receiving the
enemy's fire. Turner Ashby and his eleven at once charged,

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 51

and after a sharp engagement, routed and dispersed their forces.
It has been declared that not less than fortj^^ shots were Hred at
Ashby on that occasion, but not he nor his horse were harmed,
and at least five of the enemy were probably slain by his
hand.

From the date of his brother's death, a change passed over
the life of Turner Ashby. He always wore a sad smile after
that unhappy day, and his life became more solemn and earn-
est to the end of his own evanescent and splendid career.
" Ashby," said a lady friend, speaking of him after this period,
" is now a devoted man.'''' His behavior at his brother's grave,
ks it is described by one of the mourners at the same spot, was
most touching. He stood over the grave, took his brother's
sword, broke it and threw it into the opening; clasped his
hands and looked upward as if in resignation ; and then press-
ing his lips, as if in the bitterness of grief, while a tear rolled
down his cheek, he turned without a word, mounted his horse
and rode away. Thenceforth his name was a terror to the
enemy.

Shortly after the death of his brother, his company consented
to yield him up in order that he might accept the lieutenant-
colonelcy of the Legion, and elected First Lieut. William Tur-
ner (his cousin) captain in his stead. The Legion, numbering
at that time nearly nine hundred effective men tolerably
equipped and mounted, continued on duty in Hampshire until
the 16th of July, 1861, when it started for Manassas, but did
not arrive until after the battle. The command was immedi-
ately afterwards ordered to Staunton to join Gen. Lee's forces —
subsequently to Hollingsworth, one mile south of Winchester.
In the mean time. Col. Ashby, with several companies, was sent
on detached duty to Jefferson, into which county the enemy
was making frequent incursions from Harper's Ferry and
Maryland.

In Jefferson, Ashby Imd command of four companies of
cavalry and about eight hundred militia. Yankee raids were
kept from the doors of the inhabitants, and the enemy made
but little appearance in this portion of Yirginia, until Banks
crossed the Potomac in February, 1862.

It was about this time that Ashby's cavalry acquired its
great renown. The Lincoln soldiers dreaded nothing so much

52 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

as thej did tliese hated troopers. Go where thej would, out
of sight of their encampments, thej were ahuost sure to meet
some of Ashby's cavahy, who seemed to possess the power of
ubiquity. And, in truth, they had good cause both to hate
and to fear Asliby's cavalry ; for many a Federal horseman
dropped from his saddle, and many a Federal soldier on foot
dropped in his tracks, at the crack of Confederate rifles in the
hands of Ashby's fearless sharpshooters.

During the time of the encampment at Flowing Springs,
Col. Ashby rarely ever came into town, which was about a
mile and a half distant. Nothing could seduce him from liis
duties ; no admiration, no dinner parties or collations, could
move him to leave his camp. He always slept with his men.
No matter what hour of the night lie was aroused, he waa
always wakeful, self-possessed, and ready to do battle. He was
idolized by his men, whom he treated as companions, and
indulged without reference to rules of military discipline. He
had great contempt for the military arts, was probably incapa'
ble of drilling a regiment, and preserved among his men scarce
ly any thing more than the rude discipline of camp-hunters.
But though not a stickler for military rules, he would have no
coward or eye-soldier in his command. If a man was dissatis-
fied, he at once started him oiF home. He allowed his men
many liberties. A gentleman asked him one day where his
men were. " "Well," said he, " the boys fought very well yes-
terday, and there are not more than thirty of them here to-day."

Ashby's influence over his men was principally due to the
brilliant and amazing examples of personal courage which he
always gave them in front of the battle. His men could never
find him idle. In battle his eye kindled up most gloriously.
He wore a gray coat and pants, with boots and sash ; he always
looked like work, was frequently covered with mud, and ap-
peared to be never fatigued or dejected. He would come and
go like a dream. He would be heard of at one time in one
part of the country, and then, when least expected, would come
dashing by on the famous white horse, which was his pride.

When the fight occurred at Boteler's Mill, the militia were
for the first time under fire. The enemy had encamped on the
other side of the Potomac, opposite the mill. Our troops qui-
etly crept upon them, and planted two pieces of cannon within

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE. 53

range, and let drive at tliem with terrible effect, whereupon
thej fled. They afterwards returned in force, and ran<)^ed
themselves on the other side with long-range guns. Ashby,
to encourage the militia, who were raw, advanced to the bank
of the river, and rode his white horse up and down within
point-blank range of the enemy's fire. When the balls were
hurtling thickest, he would rein in his horse and stand perfectly
still, the very picture of daring and chivalry.

At Bolivar Heights, when the enemy were firing upon our
men and had shot down the gunners at the cannon, he sprang
from his horse and seized the rammer himself. He was con-
spicuous in action at every point. His friends used to implore
him not to ride his white horse — for he had also a black one —
but he was deaf to ever}'- caution that respected the safety of
his person.

The key to Ashby's character was his passion for danger.
He craved the excitement of battle, and was never happier
than when riding his noble steed in the thickest of the storm
of battle. There are some minds wdiich find a sweet intoxica-
tion in danger, and Macaulay has named a remarkable instance
in William HI., the silent and ascetic king of England, who
was transformed into gayety by the excitement of personal
peril. "Danger," says the historian, "acted upon him like
wine ;" it made him full of animation and speech. Ashby's
delight in danger was a royal one. It came from no brutal
hardihood or animal spirits ; and the Virginia cavalier is thus
BO far superior to other famous partisans in this war, that he
united with the adventurousness of courage the courtesies of
a gentleman and Christian, and the refinements of a pure and
gentle soul. He was never rude ; he was insensible to the hu-
mors of the vulgar ; and he never even threw into the face of his
enemy a coarse taunt or a specimen of that wit common in the
army.

Turner Ashby was doubtless as perfect a specimen of modern
chivalry as the South even has ever produced. His brilliant
daring, his extreme courtesy to woman, his devotion to the
horse, his open-hearted manner, and his scorn of mean actions,
are qualities as admirable now as in the days of Froissart's
Chronicles. After the battle of Winchester, the Yankee
women and families of oflicers sometimes came to Ashby to

54 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

get passes. Thej were surprised to find with what readiness
permits were granted. They would say, " Colonel Ashby, you
may search our baggage. We assure you we are carrying
away nothing which we are not at liberty to do." His reply
was, " I have no right to look into ladies' baggage, or to ex-
amine their trunks. Southern gentlemen do no such thing."
They said, " Colonel, you may search our persons, and see if
we carry away any thing contraband." The reply was, " Yir-
ginia gentlemen do not search the persons of ladies."

Few young men of Ashby's age could have resisted the in-
toxication of praise heaped upon him from every quarter. The
fact was, no aged and stern devotee to duty was ever more in-
sensible, in the performance of his task, to the currents of popu-
lar favor than the young Paladin of the South. The following
copy of a letter, written at the height of his reputation to an
elderly gentleman of Staiford county, illustrates the modesty
which adorned the life of Turner Ashby, and the sense of duty
which insured its most brilliant successes :

"My deak Sir : I have just received your exceedingly kind
and most flattering letter. Let me assure you that it gives me
no little pleasure to know that my course, while doing my duty
to my country, meets your approval, whose age and experience
make it more to be estimated. That I have not sought self-
aggrandizement, or regarded any thing save what I believed
to be my duty to my country in this war, I hope it is needless
to assure you. When my course meets with the approval of
the old patriots, I feel doubly satisfied that I have not mistaken
what I believe to be my duty. What you are pleased to say
of my brother (who fell as I, too, expect to fall, if my country
needs it) is but too true. Had he been spared longer, he would
doubtless have been of great value to our country. His fall,
however, has not been without its lesson to the enemy, teach-
ing them that Yirginians know how to die as well as fight for
their liberty. He died without a regret, feeling that his life
was due to his country's cause. Please present me most kindly
to all my friends in Staflford, and accept my highest respects
for yourself.

" Your obedient servant,

"Turner Ashby."

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR. 55

"We have already referred in the pages of this history to
Ashby's share in the several glorious campaigns of Jackson
in the Yalley ; to his participation in the battle of Kernstown;
to his famous adventure with the Yankee pickets at the bridge,
and to some other of his daring exploits on the front and flanks
of the enemy. It was on the occasion of the battle of Kerns-
town that his energy was exercised to an extraordinary degree
in protecting the retreat and annoying the skirts of the enemy.
In thirty-eight, out of forty-two days after this battle he was
fighting the enemy, keeping him in check, or cutting off his com-
munications. The terrible fatigues he incurred .^never seemed
to depress him, or to tax his endurance. An acquaintance tes-
tifies that it was not an infrequent feat for him to ride daily
over a line of pickets sixty or seventy miles in extent.

At a later period of the Yalley campaign, when Banks re-
turned from Strasburg and our troops were chasing him. Ash-
by would follow and charge the Yankees as the Rockbridge
Artillery poured in their fire. At one time he was riding
abreast of three hundred infantry, who were passing along the
turnpike. All at once he wheeled his horse, and leaping the
fence with drawn sword, cut his way right through them ; then
wheeling, he did the same thing a second time, lading up to
the standard-bearer, he seized it from him and dashed him>to
the earth. The terrified' wretches never raised a weapon against
him. Seventy-five of them, whom he cut ofi*, laid down their
arms, and sat down at his order in the corner of the fence,
where they remained until his men came up to take care of
them. The flag was that of a Yermont regiment. A few days
after, Mr, Boteler asked Ashby of the exploit. He drew the
flag from his bosom and gave it to him. It M-as presented by
Mr. Boteler to the Library of the State, at Richmond, where it
may now be seen — a testimony to one of the most brilliant
deeds of Yirginia's youthful hero.

A week after this adventure, Ashby was dead. But a few
days before the termination of his brilliant career, he received
the promotion which had been long due him from the govern-
ment. Just before leaving Richmond, after the adjournment
of the first session of the permanent Congress, Mr. Boteler, who
was a member of that body, and Ashby's constant friend, went
to the president, told him that he was going home, and asked

56 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

that one act of justice should be done to the people of the
Yallej, which they had long expected. He wislied to be able
to carry back to his people the assurance that Ashby should be
commissioned a brigadier-general. The order for the commis-
sion was at once made out. When the announcement was made
to Ashby, he exhibited no emotion, except that his face was
lighted up by one of those sad smiles which had occasionally
brightened it since the death of his brother.

The manner of Ashby's death has already been mentioned in
the preceding pages of the brief historical narrative of the
Yalley campaign. The writer is indebted for the particulars
of that sad event to Colonel Bradley T. Johnson, the brave
Maryland officer whose command was conspicuous in the affair
that cost Ashby his life, and earned an immortal honor in re-
venging his death. He takes the liberty of extracting from a
letter of this officer an account of the engagement :

" On the morning of Friday, the 6th of June," writes Colonel
Johnson, "we left Harrisonburg, not having seen the enemy for
two days. To our surprise, in the afternoon his cavalry made
a dash into our rear-guard, and was whipped most effectually,
their colonel. Sir Percy Wyndham, being taken prisoner. My
reo-iment was supporting a battery a short distance behind this
cavalry fight. In half an hour we were ordered forward — that
is, towards the enemy retracing the march just made. Our in-
fantry consisted only of Brigadier-general George H. Stewart's
brigade, the 58th Virginia, 44th Yirginia, two other Yirginia
regiments, and the Maryland Line — of the latter, only the 1st
Maryland was taken back ; the artillery and all the cavalry
were left behind us. The 58th Yirginia was first, my regiment
(the 1st Maryland) next, then came the 44th and the rest.

" A couple of miles east of Harrisonburg we left the road
and filed to the right, through the fields, soon changing direc-
tion again so as to move parallel to the road. General Ewell
soon sent for two of my companies as skirmishers. Moving
cautiously through the darkening shades of the tangled wood
iust as the evening twilight was brightening the trees in front
of us in an opening, spot^ spot, spot^ began a dropping fire from
the skirmishers, and instantly the o8th Yirginia poured in a
volley. Another volley was fired. The leaves began to fall,
and the bullets hit the trees around. General Ewell came up

THE SECOND TEAE OF THE WAR. 57

in a gallop. 'Charge, colonel, cliarge to the left!' And I
charged, got to the edge of the wood, and found a heavy body
of infantry and cavalry supporting a battery on a hill six hun-
dred yards in front of me. But the Yankee balls came fast
and thick on my flank. ' The 58th are firing into us,' the lead-
ing captain said. General Ewell and myself, the only mounted
ofiicers, plunged after them, and found it was not their fire. I
got back. ' Up, men, and take that hill,' pointing to my riglit.
They went in with a cheer. In less than five seconds the first
rank of the second company went down. The color-sergeant,
Doyle, fell. The corporal who caught them from him fell.
The next who took them fell, when Corporal Shanks, a six-
footer, seized them, raising them over his head at arm's length.
Captain Robertson lay dead ; Lieutenant Snowden shot to
death ; myself on the ground, my horse shot in three places.
But still we went forward, and drove the Bucktails from the
fence where they had been concealed "

It was as the brave Marylanders were pressing on in this
charge that Ashby, who was on the right of the 58th Yirginia
exhorting them, fell by an intelligent bullet of the enemy.
His death was quickly avenged. As our troops reached the
fence from which the shot had been fired, the line of Yankees
melted away like mist before a hurricane.

" The account I have given you," writes Colonel Johnson,
" of the manner of Ashby's death, is collated from the state-
ments of many eye-witnesses of my skirmishing companies, who
were all around him when he fell. I did not see it, though not
thirty yards from him, but was busy with my own men ; and
I am specific in stating the source of his death, as there is a
loose impression that he was killed by a shot from the 58th
Yirginia. I am persuaded this is not so, from the state-
ments of two very cool officers, Captain Nicholas and Lieuten-
ant Booth, who were talking to him the minute before he
fell "

"Ashby was my first revolutionary acquaintance in Yirginia.
I was with him when the first blow was struck for the cause
we both had so much at heart, and was with him in his last
fight, always knowing^ him to be beyond all modern men in
chivalry, as he was equal to any one in courage. He coi ibined
the virtues of Sir Philip Sydney with the dash of Murat. I

58 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAE.

contribute my mite to his fame, which will live in the Yalley
of Virginia, outside of books, as long as its hills and mountains
shall endure."

No word escaped from Ashby's lips as he fell. It was not
necessary. No dying legend, spoken in death's embrace, could
have added to that noble life. Itself was a beautiful poem ; a
Bounding oration ; a sufficient legacy to the virtue of his coun-
trymen.

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAE. 59

CHAPTER n.

The Situation of Eichmond. — Its Strategic Importance. — What the Yankees had
done to secure Eichmond. — The Battle of Seven Pines. — Miscarriage of Gen.
Johnston's Plans. — The Battles of the Chickahomint. — Storming of the Enemy's
Intrenchments. — McClellan driven from his Northern Line of Defences. — The
Situation on the other Side of the Chickahominy. — Magruder's Comment. — Tlie
Affair of Savage Station. — The Battle of Frazier's Farm. — A Terrible Crisis. — Battle
of Malvern Hill. — The Enemy in Communication with his Gunboats. — The Failure
to cut him off. — Glory and Fruits of our Victory. — Misrepresentations of the Yan-
kees.— Safety of Eichmond. — The War in other Parts of the Confederacy. — The
Engagement of Secessionville. — The Campaign of the West. — The Evacuation of
Corinth. — More Yankee Falsehoods. — Capture of Memphis. — The Prize of the Mis-
sissippi.— Statistics of its Navigation. — Siege of Vicksburg. — Heroism of " the Queen
City." — Morgan's Raid into Kentucky. — The Tennessee and Virginia Frontier. —
Prospects in the West. — Plan of Campaign there.

Richmond is the heart of the State of Yirginia. It is hun-
dreds of miles from the sea, yet with water communication to
Old Point, to "Washington, and to New York. It is the stra-
tegic point of the greatest importance in the whole Confed-
eracy. If Richmond had fallen before McClellan's forces, the
North expected that there would follow all of North Carolina
except the mountains, part of South Carolina, and all of Ten-
nessee that was left to us.

On the Richmond lines, two of the greatest and most splendid
armies that had ever been arrayed on a single field confronted
each other ; every accession that could be procured from the
most distant quarters to their numbers, and every thing that
could be drawn from the resources of the respective countries
of each, had been made to contribute to the strength and
splendor of the opposing hosts.

Since the commencement of the war, the North had taxed
its resources for the capture of Richmond ; nothing was omit-
ted for the accomplishment of this event ; the way had to be
opened to the capital by tedious and elaborate operations on
the frontier of Yirginia ; this accomplished, the city of Rich-
mond was surrounded by an army whose numbers was all that
could be desired ; composed of picked forces ; having every
advantage that science and art could bestow in fortifications

60 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE.

and every appliance of war ; assisted by gunboat flotillas in
two rivers, and endowed with every thing that could assure
success.

The Northern journals were unreserved in the statement
that the commands of Fremont, Banks, and McDowell had
been consolidated into one army, under Major-gen. Pope, with
a view of bringing all the Federal forces in Yirginia to co-
operate with McClellan on the Richmond lines. A portion of
this army must have reached McClellan, probably at an early
stage of the engagements in the vicinity of Richmond. In-
deed, it was stated at a subsequent period by Mr. Chandler, a
member of the Federal Congress, that the records of the War
Department at "Washington showed that more than one hun-
dred and fifty thousand men had been sent to the lines about
Richmond. There is little doubt but that, in the memorable
contest for the safety of the Confederate capital, we engaged
an army whose superiority in numbers to us was largely in-
creased by timely reinforcements, and with regard to the
operations of which the Northern government had omitted no
conditions of success.

THE BATTLE OF SEVEN PINES.

Having reached the Chickahominy, McClellan threw a
portion of his army across the river, and, having thus estab-
lished his left, proceeded to pivot upon it, and to extend his
right by the right bank of the Pamunkey, so as to get to the
north of Richmond.

Before the 30th of May, Gen. Johnston had ascertained that
Keyes' corps was encamped on this side of the Chickahominy,
near the Williamsburg road, and the same day a strong body
of the enemy was reported in front of D. H. Hill. The fol-
lowing disposition of forces was made for the attack the next
day, the troops being ordered to move at daybreak : Gen.
Hill, supported by the division of Gen. Longstreet (who had
the direction of operations on the right), was to advance by
the Williamsburg road to attack the enemy in front; Gen.
Huger, with his division, was to move down the Charles City
road, in order to attack in flank the troops who might be en-
gaged with Hill and Longstreet, unless he found in his front
force enough to occupy his division ; Gen. Smith was to march

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR. 61

to the junction of the New Bridge road and the Nine Mile
road, to be in readiness either to fall on Keyes' right flank, or
to cover Longstreet's left.

The next day hour after hour passed, while Gen. Longstreet
in vain waited for Huger's division. At two o'clock in the
afternoon he resolved to make the attack without these troops,
and moved upon the enemy with his own and D. H. Hill's
division, the latter in advance.

Hill's brave troops, admirably commanded and most gal-
lantly led, forced their way through the abattis which formed
the enemy's external defences, and stormed their intrench-
meuts by a determined and irresistible rush. Such was the
manner in which the enemy's first line was carried. The
operation was repeated with the same gallantry and success as
our troops pursued their victorious career through the enemy's
successive camps and intrenchments. At each new position
they encountered fresh troops belonging to it, and reinforce-
ments brought on from the rear. Thus they had to repel
repeated efforts to retake works which they had carried. But
their advance was never successfully resisted. Their onward
movement was only staj^ed by the coming of night. By night-
fall they had forced their way to the " Seven Pines," having
driven the enemy back more than two miles, through their
own camps, and from a series of intrenchments, and re^jelled
every attempt to recapture them with great slaugliter.

The attack on the enemy's right was not so fortunate. The
.strength of his position enabled him to hold it until dark, and
the intervention of night alone saved him from rout. On this
part of the field Gen. Johnston was severely wounded by the
fragpaent of a shell.

In his official report of the operations of the day. General
Johnston says : " Had Major-gen. Huger's division been in
position and ready for action when tliose of Smith, Long-
street, and Hill moved, I am satisfied that Keyes' corps would
liave been destroyed instead of being merely defeated." The
slow and impotent movements of Gen. Huger were excused by
himself on account of the necessity of building a bridge to
cross the swollen stream in his front, and other accidental
causes of delay.

But notwithstanding the serious diminution of the fortunes

62 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

of the day by Huger's mishaps, they were yet conspicuous.
We had taken ten pieces of artillery and six thousand muskets,
besides other spoils. Our total loss was more than four thou-
sand. That of the enemy is stated in their own newspapers
to have exceeded ten thousand — an estimate which is no doubt
short of the truth.

On the morning of the first of June, the enemy made a weak
demonstration of attack on our lines. The 9th and 14tli Vir-
ginia regiments were ordered to feel for the enemy, and while
thus engaged suddenly came upon a body of fifteen thousand
Yankees intrenched in the woods. Under the murderous fire
poured into their ranks, our troops were forced to fall back,
but were rallied by the self-devoted gallantry of their ofiicers.
Col. Godwin, the dashing and intrepid commander of the 9th,
received a Minnie ball in the leg, and a moment later had his
hip crushed by the fall of his horse, which was shot under him.
He was thirty paces in advance of his regiment when the attack
was made, encouraging his men. At last, reinforcements
coming up, the attack of the enemy was vigorously repulsed.
This was the last demonstration of the enemy, who proceeded
to strengthen those lines of intrenchments from which he had
not yet been driven.

THE BATTLES OF THE CHICKAHOMINY.

Upon taking command of the Confederate army in the field,
after Gen. Johnston had been wounded in the battle of Seven
Pines, Gen. Lee did not hesitate to adopt the spirit of that com-
mander, which had already been displayed in attacking the
enemy, and which indicated the determination on his part, that
the operations before Kichmond should not degenerate into a
siege.

The course of the Chickahominy around Eichmond#affords
an idea of the enemy's position at the commencement of the
action. This stream meanders through the Tide-water district
of Virginia — its course approaching that of the arc of a circle
in the neighborhood of Richmond — until it reaches the lower
end of Charles City county, where it abruptly turns to the
south and empties into the James. A portion of the enemy's
forces had crossed to the south side of the Chickahominy, and

(iyK</I)J^

GEN, A, P. H I LL.
Frot/ha. Pluwpaph la^'^^i frcTw life.

E agrav^-,^ f ,-t h-i ° p o - -n i_ Yp qr - f t >

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 63

were fortified on the Williamsburg road. On the north hank
of the stream the enemj was strongly posted for many miles;
the heights on that side of the stream having been fortified
with great energy and skill from Meadow Bridge, on a line
nearly due north from the city to a point below Bottom's
Bridge, which is due east. This line of the enemy extended
for about twenty miles.

Reviewing the situation of the two armies at the commence-
ment of the action, the advantage was entirely our own.
McClellan had divided his army on the two sides of the Chick-
ahominy, and operating apparently with the design of half cir-
cumvallating Richmond, had spread out his forces to an extent
that impaired the faculty of concentration, and had made a
weak and dangerous extension of his lines.

On Thursday, the 26th of June, at three o'clock, Major-gen.
Jackson — fresh from the exploits of his magnificent campaign
in the Yalley — took up his line of march from Ashland, and
proceeded down the country between the Chickahominy and Pa-
munkey rivers. The enemy collected on the north bank of the
Chickahominy, at the point where it is crossed by the Brooke
turnpike, were driven oflf, and Brigadier-gen. Branch, crossing
the stream, directed his movements for a junction with the
column of Gen. A. P. Hill, which had crossed at Meadow
Bridge. Gen. Jackson having borne away from the Chicka-
hominy, so as to gain ground towards the Pamunkey, marched
to the left of Mechanicsville, while Gen. Hill, keeping well to
the Chickahominy, approached that village and engaged the
enemy there.

With about fourteen thousand men (Gen. Branch did not
arrive until nightfall) Gen. Hill engaged the forces of the
enemy, until night put an end to the contest. While he did
not succeed, in that limited time, in routing the enemy, his
forces stubbornly maintained the possession of Mechanicsville
and the ground taken by them on the other side of the Chick-
ahominy. Driven from the immediate locality of Mechanics-
ville, the enemy retreated during the night down the river to
Powhite swamp, and night closed the operations of Thursday.

64 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR.

STOEMESTG OF THE ENEMt's INTKENCHMENTS.

The road having been cleared at Mechanicsville, Gen, Long-
street's corjps d^armee, consisting of his veteran division of the
Old Guard of the Army of the Potomac, and Gen. D. H. Iliirs
division, debouched from the woods on the south side of the
Chickahominy, and crossed that river. Friday morning the
general advance upon the enemy began; Gen. A. P. Hill in
the centre, and bearing towards Gold Harbor, while Gen. Long-
street and Gen. D. H. Hill came down the Chickahominy to
New Bridge. Gen. Jackson still maintained his position in
advance, far to the left, and gradually converging to the Chick-
ahominy again.

The position of the enemy was now a singular one. One
portion of his army was on the south side of the Chickahom-
iny, fronting Richmond, and confronted by Gen. Magrtider.
The other portion, on the north side, had fallen back to a new
line of defences, where McClellan proposed to make a decisive
battle.

As soon as Jackson's arrival at Cold Harbor was announced,
Gen. Lee and Gen. Longstreet, accompanied by their respect-
ive staffs, rode by Gaines' Mill, and halted at New Cold Har-
bor, where they joined Gen. A. P. Hill. Soon the welcome
sound of Jackson's guns announced that he was at work.

The action was now to become general for the first time on
the Richmond lines ; and a collision of numbers was about to
take place equal to any that had yet occurred in the history of
the war.

From four o'clock until eight the battle raged with a display
of the utmost daring and intrepidity on the part of the Con-
federate army. The enemy's lines were finally broken, and his
strong positions all carried, and night covered the retreat of
McClellan's broken and routed columns to the south side of the
Chickahominy.

The assault of the enemy's works near Gaines' Mill is a
memorable part of the engagement of Friday, and the display
of fortitude, as well as quick and dashing gallantry of our
troops on that occasion, takes its place by the side of the most
glorious exploits of the war. Gen. A. P. Hill had made the

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 65

first assault upon tlie lines of the enemy's intrenchments near
Gaines' Mill. A fierce struggle had ensued between his di-
vision and the garrison of the line of defence. Repeated
charges were made by Hill's troops, but the formidable char-
acter of the works, and murderous volleys from the artillery
covering them, kept our troops in check. Twenty-six pieces
of artillery were thundering at them, and a perfect hailstorm
of lead fell thick and fast around them. In front stood Fed-
eral camps, stretching to the northeast for miles. Drawn up in
line of battle were more than three full divisions, commanded
by McCall, Porter, and Sedgwick. Banners darkened the air;
artillery vomited forth incessant volleys of grape, canister, and
shell ; and the wing of death waved everywhere in the sul-
phurous atmosphere of the battle.

It was past four o'clock when Pickett's brigade from Long-
street's division came to Hill's support. Pickett's regiments
fought with the most determined valor. At last, "Whiting's
division, composed of the " Old Third" and Texan brigades,
advanced at a double-quick, charged the batteries," and drove
the enemy from his strong line of defence. The 4th Texas
regiment was led by a gallant Yirginian, Col. Bradfute War-
wick. As the regiment was marching on with an irresistible
impetuosity to the charge, he seized a battle-flag which had
been abandoned by one of our regiments, and, bearing it aloft,
he passed both of the enemy's breastworks in a most gallant
style, and as he was about to plant the colors on a battery that
the regiment captured, his right breast was pierced by a Minie
ball, and he fell mortally wounded.

The works carried by our noble troops would have been in-
vincible to the bayonet, had they been garrisoned by men less
dastardly than the Yankees. All had been done on our side
with the bullet and the bayonet. For four hours had our in-
ferior force, unaided by a single j)iece of artillery, withstood
over thirty thousand, assisted by twenty-six pieces of artillery;j_j

To keep the track of the battle, which had swept around
Kichmond, we must have reference to some of the principal
]K>ints of locality in the enemy's lines. It will be recollected
that it was on Thursday evening when the attack was com-
menced upon the enemy near Meadow Bridge. This locality
is about six miles distant from the city, on a line almost due

5

66 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK.

north. This position was the enemy's extreme right. His
lines extended from here across the Chickahominy, near the
Po white Creek, two or three miles above the crossing of tlie
York River raib'oad. From Meadow Bridge to this raih-oad,
the distance along the Chickahominy on the north side is about
ten miles. The different stages between the points indicated,
along which the enemy were driven, are Mechanicsville, about
a mile north of the Chickahominy ; further on, Beaver Dam
Creek, emptying into the Chickahominy ; then the New Bridge
road, on which Cold Harbor is located ; and then Powhite
Creek, \vhere the enemy had made his last stand, and been re-
pulsed from the field.

The York River railroad runs in an easterly direction, inter-
secting the Chickahominy about ten miles from the city. South
of the railroad is the Williamsburg road, connecting with the
Nine Mile road at Seven Pines. The former road connects
with the New Bridge road, which turns off and crosses the
Chickahominy. From Seven Pines, where the Nine Mile road
joins the upper one, the road is known as the old Williamsburg
road, and crosses the Chickahominy at Bottom's Bridge.

With the bearing of these localities in his mind, the reader
will readily understand how it was that the enemy was driven
from his original strongholds on the north side of the Chicka-
hominy, and how, at the time of Friday's battle, he had been
compelled to surrender the possession of the Fredericksburg
and Central railroads, and had been pressed to a position
where he was cut off from the principal avenues of supply
and escape. The disposition of our forces was such as to cut
off all communication between McClellan's army and the
White House, on the Pamunkey river ; he had been driven
completely from his northern line of defences ; and it was sup-
posed that he would be unable to extricate himself from his
position without a victory or capitulation.

On Sunday morning, it appears that our pickets, on the Nine
Mile road, having engaged some small detachments of the en-
emy and driven them beyond their fortifications, found them
deserted. In a short while it became known to our generals
that McClellan, having massed his entire force on this side of
the Chickahominy, was retreating towards James river.

The intrenchments, which the enemy had deserted, were

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 67

found to be formidable and elaborate. That immediately
across the railroad, at the six-mile post, which had been sup-
posed to be light earthwork, designed to sweep the railroad,
turned out to be an immense embrasured fortification, extend-
ing for hundreds of yards on either side of the track. Within
this work were found great quantities of fixed ammunition,
which had apparently been prepared for removal and then de-
serted. All the cannon, as at other intrenchments, had been
carried off. A dense cloud of smoke was seen issuing from the
woods two miles in advance of the battery and half a mile to
the right of the railroad. The smoke was found to proceed
from a perfect mountain of the enemy's commissary stores,
consisting of sugar, coff'ee, and bacon, prepared meats, vege-
tables, &c., which he had fired. The fields and woods around
this spot were covered with every description of clothing and
camp equipage. ISTo indication was wanting that the enemy
had left this encampment in haste and disorder.

The enemy had been imperfectly watched at a conjuncture
the most critical in the contest, and through an omission of our
guard — the facts of which are yet the subject of some contro-
versy— McClellan had succeeded in massing his entire force,
and taking up a line of retreat, by which he hoped to reach
the cover of his gunboats on the James. But the most unfor*
tunate circumstance to us was, that since the enemy had escaped
from us in his fortified camp, his retreat was favored by a coun-
try, th-e characteristics of which are unbroken forests and wide
swamps, where it was impossible to pursue him with rapidity,
and extremely diflicult to reconnoitre his position so as to bring
him to decisive battle.

In an ofiicial report of the situation of forces on the Rich-
mond side of the Chickahominy, Gen. Magruder describes it
as one of the gravest peril. He states that the larger portion
of the enemy was on that side of the Chickahominy ; that the
bridges had all been destroyed, and but one rebuilt — the New
Bridge — which was commanded fully by the enemy's guns ;
and tliat there were but twenty-five thousand men between
McClellan's army of one hundred thousand and Richmond.
Referring to a situation so extremely critical, he says : " Had
McClellan massed his whole force in column, and advanced it
against any point of our line of battle, as was done at Auster-

68 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE "WAK.

litz under similar circumstances, by the greatest captain of aiiv
age, though the head of his column would have suffered greatly,
its momentum would have insured him success, and the occu-
pation of our works about Richmond, and, consequently, of the
. citj, might have been his reward.' V- Taking this view of the sit-
uation, Gen. Magruder states that his relief was great when it
was discovered the next day that the enemy had left our front
and was continuing to retreat.

The facts, however, are contrary to the theory of Gen. Ma-
gruder and to the self-congratulations which he derives from
it. Our troops on the two sides of the river were only separ-
ated until we succeeded in occupying the position near what is
known as New Bridge, which occurred before 12 o'clock m.,
on Friday, June 27, and before the attack on the enemy at
Gaines' Mill. From the time we reached the position referred
to, our communications between the two wings of our army
may be regarded as re-establised. The bridge referred to and
another about three-quarters of a mile above were ordered to
be repaired before noon on Friday, and the new bridge was
sufficiently rebuilt to be passed by artillery on Friday night,
and the one above it was used for the passage of wagons, am
bulances, and troops early on Saturday morning. Besides this,
all other bridges above New Bridge, and all the fords above
that point, were open to us.

THE AFFAIR AT SAVAGe's STATION.

During Sunday, a portion of the enemy was encountered
upon the York River railroad, near a place called Savage's Sta-
tion, the troops engaged on our side being the division of Gen.
McLaws, consisting of Generals Kershaw and Semmes' brigades,
supported by Gen. Griffith's brigade from Magruder's division.
The Federals were found to be strongly intrenched, and as
soon as our skirmishers came in view, they were opened upon
with a furious cannonade from a park of field-pieces. Kem-
per's battery now went to the front, and for three hours the
battle raged hotly, when the discomfited Yankees again re-
sumed their reti'eat. Early in the day, on reaching the re
doubts, Gen. Griffiths, of Mississippi, one of the heroes of Lees-
burg, was killed by the fragment of a shell. lie was the only

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 69

general officer killed on our side during the whole of the bloody
week.

In this encounter with the enemy, the gallant 10th Georgia
regiment suffered severely, engaging the enemy hand to hand,
and leaving upon the field memorable evidences of their cour-
age. The enemy, to use an expression of his prisoners, was
" mowed down" by the close fire of our adventurous troops ;
and the failure of the attempt of McClellan to break through
our lines at this point, left him to continue a hopeless retreat.

THE BATTLE OF FRAYSEr's FARM.

By daybreak on Monday morning, the pursuit of the enemy
was actively resumed. D. H. Hill, Whiting, and Ewell, under
command of Jackson, crossed the Chickahominy by the Grape-
vine bridge, and followed the enemy on their track by the
Williamsburg road and Savage's Station. Longstreet, A. P.
Hill, Huger, and Magruder pursued the enemy by the Charles
City road, with the intention of cutting him off.

The divisions of Generals Hill and Longstreet were, during
the whole of the day, moving in the hunt for the enemy. The
disposition which was made of our forces, brought Gen. Long-
street on the enemy's front, immediately supported by Gen.
Hill's division, consisting of six brigades. The forces com-
manded by Gen. Longstreet were his old division, consisting
of six brigades.

The position of the enemy was about five miles northeast of
Darbytown, on the !New Market road. The immediate scene
of the battle was a plain of sedge pines, in the cover of which
the enemy's forces were skilfully disposed — the locality being
known as Fraj'ser's farm. In advancing upon the enemy, bat-
teries of sixteen heavy guns were opened upon the advance
columns of Gen. Hill. Our troops, pressing heroically for-
ward, had no sooner got within musket range, than the enemy,
forming several lines of battle, poured upon them from his
heavy masses a devouring tire of musketry. The conflict be-
came terrible, the air being filled with missiles of death, every
moment having its peculiar sound of terror, and every spot
its sight of ghastly destruction and horror. It is impossible
that in any of the series of engagements which had taken place

70 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

"within the past few days, and had tracked the lines of Kich-
mond with fire and destruction, there could have been more
desperate fighting on the part of onr troops. Never was a
more glorious victory plucked from more desperate and threat-
ening circumstances. While exposed to the double fire of the
enemy's batteries and his musketry, we were unable to contend
with him with artillery. But although thus unmatched, our
brave troops pressed on with un quailing vigor ^nd a resistless
courage, driving the enemy before them. This was accom-
plished without artillery, there being but one battery in Gen.
Hill's command on the spot, and that belonged to Longstreet's
division, and could not be got into position. Thus the fight
continued with an ardor and devotion that few battle-fields
have ever illustrated. Step by step the enemy were driven
back, his guns taken, and the ground he abandoned strewn
with his dead. By half-past eight o'clock we had taken all
his cannon, and, continuing to advance, had driven him a mile
and a half from his ground of battle.

Our forces were still advancing upon the retreating lines of
the enemy. It was now about half-past nine o'clock, and very
dark. Suddenly, as if it had burst from the heavens, a sheet
of fire enveloped the front of our advance. The enemy had
made another stand to receive us, and from the black masses
of his forces, it was evident that he had been heavily rein-
forced, and that another whole corjps d'armee had been brought
up to contest the fortunes of the night. Line after line of
battle was formed. It was evident that his heaviest columns
were now being thrown against our small command, and it
might have been supposed that he would only be satisfied with
its annihilation. The loss here on our side was terrible.

The situation being evidently hopeless for any further pur-
suit of the fugitive enemy, who had now brought up such over-
whelming forces, our troops retired slowly.

At this moment, seeing their adversary retire, the most
vociferous cheers arose along the M^hole Yankee line. They
were taken up in the distance by the masses which for miles
and miles beyond were supporting McClellan's front. It was
a moment when the heart of the stoutest commander might
have been appalled. The situation of our forces was now as
desperate as it well could be, and required a courage and

TH35 SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR. 71

presence of mind to retrieve it, which the circumstances which
surrounded them were not well calculated to inspire. They
had fought for five or six hours without reinforcements. All
our reserves had been brought up in the action. Wilcox's
brigade, which had been almost annihilated, was re-forming in
the rear.

Riding rapidly to the position of this brigade, Gen. Hill
brought them by great exertions up to the front, to check the
advance of the now confident, cheering enemy. Catching the
spirit of their commander, the brave but jaded men moved up
to the front, replying to the enemy's cheers with shouts and
yells. At this demonstration, which the enemy, no doubt, sup-
posed signified heavy reinforcements, he stopped his advance.
It was now about half-past ten o'clock in the night. The
enemy had been arrested ; and the fight — one of the most re-
markable, long-contested, and gallant ones that had yet occurred
on our lines — was concluded with the achievement of a field
under the most trying circumstances, which the enemy, with the
most overpowering numbers brought up to reinforce him, had
not succeeded in reclaiming.

Gen. Magruder's division did not come up until eleven
o'clock at niglit, after the fight had been concluded. By orders
from Gen. Lee, Magruder moved upon and occupied the battle-
ground ; Gen. Hill's command being in such a condition of
prostration from their long and toilsome fight, and suffering
in killed and wounded, that it was proper they should be re-
lieved by the occupatioQ of the battle-ground by a fresh cor^s
d'armee.

THE BATTLE OF MALVERN HILL.

Early on Tuesday morning, the enemy, from the position to
which he had been driven the night before, continued his
retreat in a southeasterly direction towards his gunboats in
James river.

General Magruder was directed to proceed by the Quaker
road, and to form on the right of Jackson. On account of a
misunderstanding as to which was the Quaker road, the v/rong
route was taken by General Magruder ; and the direction of
his movement was subsequently changed, so as to place his

72 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK.

troops on the right of Huger, who in the mean time had formed
on the right of Jackson.

The enemy had now placed himself in communication with
his gunboats in the river. He was strongly posted on the
crest of a hill, commanding an undulating field, which fell to
our right into a plain or meadow. His batteries of artillery
were numerous, and were collected into two large bodies,
strongly supported by infantry, and commanded perfectly the
meadow on our right, and the field in our front, except the
open ravines formed by the undulations of the ground.

An order was dispatched by General Magruder to bring up
from all the batteries thirty rifle pieces, if possible, with which
he hoped to shatter the enemy's infantry. While delay was
thus occasioned, he was ordered to make the attack. Eeturn-
ing rapidly to the position occupied by the main body of his
troops, he gave Brigadier-general Jones the necessary orders
for the advance of his division. "While this was being done, a
heavy and crushing fire was opened from the enemy's guns, of
great range and metal.

General Armistead having repulsed, driven back, and fol-
lowed up a heavy body of the enemy's skirmishers, an order
was received from General Lee by Magruder, directing hira
" to advance rapidly, press forward his whole line and follow
up Armistead's successes, as the enemy were reported to be
getting off." In the mean time Mahone's and Ransom's bri-
gades of Huger's division having been ordered up. General
Magruder gave the order that Wright's brigade, supported by
Mahone's, should advance and attack the enemy's batteries on
the right, and that Jones' division, expected momentarily,
should advance on the front, and Ransom's brigade should
attack on the left. The plan of attack was to hurl about fifteen
thousand men against the enemy's batteries and supporting
infantry — to follow up any successes they might obtain ; and if
unable to drive the enemy from his strong position, to continue
the fight in front by pouring in fresh troops ; and in case they
were repulsed, to hold strongly the line of battle where we
etood.

At about 5 o'clock p. m., the order was given to our men to
charge across the field and drive the enemy from their posi-
tion. Gallantly they sprang to the encounter, rushing into

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 73

the field at a full run. Instantly, from the line of the eneni^-'s
breastworks, a murderous storm of grape and canister was
hurled into their ranks, with the most terrible effect. Officers
and men went down by hundreds ; but yet, undaunted and
unwavering, our line dashed on, until two-thirds of the distance
across the field was accomplished. Here the carnage from the
withering fire of the enemy's combined artillery and musketry
was dreadful. Our line wavered a moment, and fell back to
the cover of the woods. Twice again the eflfort to carry the
position was renewed, but each time with the same result.

The hill was bathed with flames. Towards sunset the earth
quivered with the terrific concussion of artillery and hnge ex-
plosions. Shells raced athwart the horizon, exploding into
deadly iron hail. The forms of smoke-masked men ; the gleam
of muskets on the plains, where soldiers were disengaged ; the
artistic order of battle; the wild career of wilder horsemen
plunging to and fro across the field, formed a scene of exciting
grandeur. In the forest, where eyes did not penetrate, there
was nothing but the exhilarating and exhausting spasm of
battle.

As the night fell the battle slackened. We had not carried
the enemy's position, but we occupied the field, and during the
night posted our pickets within one hundred yards of his guns.
The brigades of Mahone and Wright slept on the battle-field
in the advanced positions they had won, and Armistead's bri-
gade and a portion of Ransom's also occupied the battle-field.

The battle of Tuesday, properly known as that of Malvern
Hill, was perhaps the most sanguinary of the series of bloody
conflicts which had taken place on the lines about Richmond.
Although not a defeat, it broke the chain of our victories. It
was made memorable by its melancholy monument of carnage,
which was probably greater than Gen. Magruder's estimate,
which states that our loss fell short of three thousand. But it
had given the enemy no advantage, except in the unfruitful
sacrifice of the lives of our troops ; and the line of his retreat
was again taken up, his forces toiling towards the river through
mud, swamp, and forest.

The skill and spirit with which McClellan had managed to
retreat was, indeed, remarkable, and afi'orded no mean proofs
of his generalship. At every stage of his retreat he had con-

74 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

fronted our forces with a strong rear-gnard, and had enconi
tered ns with well-organized lines of battle, and regular disp(-
sitions of infantry, cavalry, and artillery. His heavy rifled
cannon had been used against ns constantly on his retreat. A
portion of his forces had npw efiected communication with the
river at points below City Point. The plan of cutting off his
communication with the river, which was to have been executed
by a movement of Holmes' division between him and the river,
was frustrated by the severe tire of the gunboats, and since
then the situation of the enemy appeared to be that of a divi-
sion or dispersion of his forces, one portion resting on the river,
and the other^ to some extent, involved by our lines.

It had been stated to the public of Richmond, with greal
precision of detail, that on the evening of Saturday, the 28th
of June, we had brought the enemy to bay on the South side
of the Chickahominy, and that it only remained to finish him
in a single battle. Such, in fact, appeared to have been the
situation then. The next morning, however, it was perceived
that our supposed resources of generalship had given us too
much confidence ; that the enemy had managed to extricate
himself from the critical position, and, having massed his forces,
had succeeded, under cover of the night, in opening a way to
the James river.*

Upon this untoward event, the operations of our army on the
Richmond side of the Chickahominy were to follow the fugi-
tive enemy through a country where he had admirable oppor-
tunities of concealment, and through the swamps and forests

* With reference to McClellan's escape from White Oak Swamp to the river,
letters of Yankee officers, published in the Northern journals, stated that when
McClellan, on Saturday evening, sent his scouts down the road to Turkey Island
bridge, he was astonished and delighted to find that our forces had not occupied
that road, and immediately started his wagon and artillery trains, which were
quietly passing down that road all night to the James river, whilst our forces
were quietly sleeping within four miles of the very road they should have occu-
pied, and should have captured every one of the enemy's one thousand wagons
and four hundred cannon. It is further stated in these letters, that if we had
blocked up that only passage of escape, their entire army must have surrendered
or been starved out in twenty-four hours. These are the Yankees' own accounts
of how much they were indebted to blunders on our part for the success ot
McClellan's retreat — a kind of admission not popular with a vain and self-
adulatory enemy.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. Y5

of which he had retreated with the most remarkable ju Jgment,
dexterity, and spirit of fortitude.

The glory and fruits of our victory may have been seriously
diminished by the grave mishap or fault by which the enemy
was permitted to leave his camp on the south side of the Chick-
ahominy, in an open country, and to plunge into the dense
cover of wood and swamp, where the best portion of a whole
week was consumed in hunting him, and finding out his new
position only in time to attack him under the uncertainty and
disadvantage of the darkness of night.

But the successes achieved in the series of engagements
which had already occurred were not to be lightly esteemed,
or to be depreciated, because of errors which, if they had not
occurred, would have made our victory more glorious and more
complete. The siege of Kichmond had been raised ; an array
of one hundred and fifty thousand men had been pushed from
their strongholds and fortifications, and put to flight ; we had
enjoj^ed the edat of an almost daily succession of victories; we
had gathered an immense spoil in stores, provisions, and ar-
tillery ; and we had demoralized and dispersed, if we had not
succeeded in annihilating, an army which had every resource
that could be summoned to its assistance, every possible ad-
dition to numbers within the reach of the Yankee government,
and every material condition of success to insure for it the
great prize of the capital of the Confederacy, which was now,
as far as human judgment could determine, irretrievably lost
to them, and secure in the protection of a victorious army.

The Northern papers claimed that the movements of Mc-
Clellan from the Chickahominy river were purely strategic,
and that he had obtained a position where he would establish
a new base of operations against Richmond. Up to the first
decisive stage in the series of engagements — Cold Harbor —
there were certainly plain strategic designs in his backward
movement. His retirement from Mechanicsville was probably
voluntary, and intended to concentrate his troops lower down,
where he might fight with the advantages of numbers and his
own selection of position. Continuing his retreat, he fixed the
decisive field at Cold Harbor. Again having been pushed
from his strongholds north of the Chickahominy, the enemy

76 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

made a strong attempt to retrieve his disasters bj renewing a
concentration of his troops at Frayser's farm.

From the time of these two principal battles, all pretensions
of the enemy's retreat to strategy must cease. His retreat was
now unmistakable; it was no longer a falling back to concen-
trate troops for action ; it is, in fact, impossible to disguise that
it was the retreat of an enemy who was discomfited and
whipped, although not routed. He had abandoned the rail-
roads ; he had given up the strongholds which he had provided
to secure him in case of a check ; he had destroyed from eight
to ten millions dollars' worth of stores; he had deserted his
hospitals, his sick and wounded, and he had left in our hands
thousands of prisoners and innumerable stragglers.

Regarding all that had been accomplished in these battles ;
the displays of the valor and devotion of our troops ; the ex-
penditure of blood ; and the helpless and fugitive condition to
which the enemy had at last been reduced, there was cause for
the keenest regrets that an enemy in this condition was per-
mitted to secure his retreat. It is undoubtedly true, that in
failing to cut oflf McClellan's retreat to the river, we failed to
accomplish the most important condition for the completion of
our victory. But although the result of the conflict had fallen
below public expectation, it was sufficiently fortunate to excite
popular joy, and grave enough to engage the most serious
speculation as to the future.

The mouth of the Yankee government was shut from any
more promises of a speedy termination of the war ; the powers
of Europe saw that the Southern Confederacy was not yet
crushed, or likely to be crushed, by its insolent foe ; and the
people of the South had again challenged the confidence of the
world in the elasticity of their fortunes and the invincible
destiny of their independence.

The fortune of events in other parts of the Confederacy,
taking place about the time of the relief of Richmond, or
closely following it, although less striking and dramatic, was
not unpropitious. These events, a rapid survey of which takes
us from the seacoast to the Mississippi frontier, added to the
exultations which the victories of the Chickahominy had occa-
sioned, and, although qualified by some disasters, enlarged and
enlightened the prospects of the future.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 77

A few days before the great battles had been joined around
Richmond, a brilliant success over the Yankees had been ob-
tained in an engagement on James Island in the neighborhood
of Charleston. The battle of Secessionville, as it was called,
occurred on the 16th of June. About four o'clock in 'the
morning of that day, the enemy, taking advantage of the neg-
ligence of our pickets, drove them in, or captured them, some
eight hundred yards in front of the battery at Secessionville,
and, advancing rapidly upon this work in line of battle, arrived
within a few hundred yards of it before we could open upon
him. The men, however, were at their guns, which were at
once well and rapidly served, while the infantry was moved
promptly into position under the orders of Col. J. G. Lamar,
the heroic commander of the post. It was not long after get-
ting the infantry into position, that the enemy were driven
back in confusion. They were soon, however, reinforced, and
made another desperate charge, when they were again driven
back ; a third time they came, but only to meet with the most
determined repulse. They then made a flank movement on
our right, on the west of Secessionville, where they were gal-
lantly met by the Charleston battalion, which was soon rein-
forced by the Louisiana battalion. Three times had the heroic
band of Confederates repulsed (often at the point of the bay-
onet) a force thrice their strength, under the fire of three gun-
boats and four land batteries. About ten o'clock the enemy
retreated in great confusion, leaving their dead and wounded
on the field, a number lying in our trenches. The loss of the
enemy was. at least four hundred in killed, wounded, and pris-
oners. Their dead in front of the Secessionville works num-
bered one hundred and sixty-eight. Our loss was forty killed,
and about twice that number wounded.

In the situation in the West some important changes had
transpired in the early months of the summer.

The evacuation of Corinth was determined upon by Gen.
Beauregard, after having twice ofiered the enemy battle outside
of his intrenched lines, and was accomplished on the 30th of
May. The transparent object of the Yankee commander was
to cut off our resources, by destroying the Mobile and Ohio
and Memphis and Charleston railroads. This was substantially
foiled by the evacuation and withdrawal of our forces along

78 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAB.

f

the line of the former road. Remaining in rear of the Tus-
ciimbia and its affluents, some six miles from Corinth, long
enough to collect stragglers. Gen. Beauregard resumed his
march, concentrating his main forces at Baldwin. On June
Ttli he left Baldwin, it offering no advantages of a defensive
character, and assembled the main bod j of his forces at Tupelo.

On the morning of the evacuation of Corinth, our effective
force did not exceed forty-seven thousand men of all arms ;
that of the enemy, obtained from the best sources of informa-
tion, could not have been less than ninety thousand men of all
arms. The story of the evacuation was flourished by the
Yankees as a great success on their side, and coupled with an
audacious falsehood reported by Gen. Pope to Gen. Halleck,
then in command of the enemy's forces in the West, to the
effect that he had taken ten thousand prisoners and fifteen
thousand stand of arms. The facts are, that the retreat was
conducted with great order and precision ; and that, despite
the boasts of the ISTorth to the contrary, we lost no more pris-
oners than the enemy did himself, and abandoned to him in
stores not more than would amount to one day's expense of
our army.

The capture of Memphis was another step towards the reali-
zation of the enemy's great object of opening the navigation
of the Mississippi, which was persistently demanded by the
]!^orthwestern States, as the price of their contributions to the
war, and their support of the administration at Washington.*
This city had been formally surrendered to the Yankees after
a naval engagement in front of it on the 6th of June, in which
our loss was eighty killed and wounded and seventy-five taken
prisoners, and four gunboats sunk.

* The Board of Trade of St. Louis published a paper on this subject, which
assumed the ground that the object of the Confederacy was to hold the entire
and exclusive control of the Mississippi. It went into detail to show how great
a loss the present obstruction of that highway was to the "loyal" Western
8tates. It was the natural outlet to the produce of the Upper Valley. During
the year 1860, the shipments from Cairo and points above the Mississippi and its
tributaries, by way of the lower Mississippi, amounted to a million of tons, of
which 400,000 went from St. Louis. It averred that the difference in cost of
freight by the river and the railroad was ten dollars a ton ; also, that this, with
the return freight, would amount to a total of $15,000,000 tax on the Western
people by reason of the closing of the river.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 79

Tlie occupation of Memphis by the enemy was a serious dis-
aster to the South, although it did not open the Mississippi ;
for it gave him extraordinary facilities for almost daily rein
forcements of men and supplies, and for the preparation of
expeditions to penetrate to the heart of the Confederacy.

But the enemy received a check on the Mississippi where
he had least expected it. On the 24:th of June, his combined
fleet retired, and abandoned the siege of Vicksburg, without
accomplishing any thing, after a siege of six weeks. No injury
was sustained by any of the batteries at Yicksburg. The
number of shells thrown into the city and at the batteries
amounted to 25,000. The casualties in the city were one
woman and one negro man killed, and among the soldiers on
guard and at the batteries there were twenty-two killed and
wounded. The lower bombarding fleet, urWler command of
Cums. Farragut and Porter, consisted of 18 gun and mortar
boats, 5 sloops-of-war and 70 transports ; the upper fleet con-
sisted of 11 gunboats and rams, and 13 transports, under
command of Com. Davis.

The people of the South found in the defence of Yicksburg
a splendid lesson of magnanimity and disinterested patriotism.
For several weeks the city had resisted successfully the attack
of the enemy's gunboats, mortar fleets, and heavy siege guns.
She was threatened by powerful fleets above and below, and
yet, with unexampled spirit, the Queen 'City of the Bluffs sus-
tained the iron storm that was rained upon her for weeks with
continued fury.

New Orleans, Baton Houge, Natchez, and Memphis were in
the hands of the Yankees, and their possession by the enemy
might have furnished to Yicksburg, in its exposed and des-
perate situation, the usual excuses of timidity and sellishness
for its surrender. But the brave city resisted these vile and
unmanly excuses, and gave to the world one of the proudest
and most brilliant illustrations of the earnestness and devotion
of the people of the South that had yet adorned the war.

The fact that but little hopes could be entertained of the
eventual success of the defence of Yicksburg against the
powerful concentration of the enemy's navy heiglitened the
nobility of the resistance she made. The resistance of the enemy
in circumstances which afford but a feeble and uncertain pros-

80 THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAK.

pect of victory requires a great spirit ; but it is more invalu-
ble to us than a hundred easy victories ; it teaches the enemy
that M^e are invincible and overcomes him with despair ; it
exhibits to the world the inspirations and moral grandeur
of our cause ; and it educates our people in chivalry and
warlike virtues by the force of illustrious examples of self-
devotion.

But the people of the South had the satisfaction of witnessing
an unexpected issue of victory in the siege of Yicksburg, and
had occasion to learn another lesson that the history of all
wars indicates, that the practical test of resistance affords
the only sure determination whether a place is defensible
or not. With a feeling of inexpressible pride did Yicksburg
behold two immense fleets, each of which had been heretofore
invincible, brought to bay, and unable to cope with her, kept
at a respectful distance, and compelled to essay the extraordi-
nary task of digging a new channel for the Mississippi.

In the month of July occurred the remarkable expedition of
the celebrated John Morgan into Kentucky. The expedition
of this cavalier was one of the most brilliant, rapid, and suc-
cessful raids recorded in history. Composed of a force less
than one thousand, consisting of Morgan's own regiment, with
some partizan rangers from Georgia, and a Texas squadron, to
which was attached two companies of Tennessee cavalry, it
penetrated as far as Cynthianna. It was Morgan's intention
to make a stand at Richmond, Kentucky, to await reinforce-
ments, as he was persuaded that nearly the whole people of
that State was ready to rise and join him; but finding that
the enemy were endeavoring to envelope him with large bodies
of cavalry, he was compelled to fall back. On reaching Som-
erset, he took possession of the telegraph, and very coolly
countermanded all the previous orders that had been given by
Gen. Boyle at Louisville to pursue him.

He had left Knoxville on the fourth day of July with nine
hundred men, and returned to Lexington on the 28th with
nearly twelve hundred. In twenty-four days he had pene-
trated two hundred and fifty miles into a country in full pos-
session of the Yankees ; captured seventeen towns ; met, fought,
and captured a Yankee force superior to his own in numbers ;
captured three thousand stand of arms at Lebanon ; and, from

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 81

first to last, destroyed during his raid military stores, railroad
bridges, and other property to the value of eight or ten millions
of dollars. He accomplished all this, besides putting the
people of Cincinnati into a condition, described by one of their
newspapers, as " bordering on frenzy," and returned to Ten-
nessee with a loss in all his engagements of not more than
ninety men in killed, wounded and missing.

While some activity was shown in extreme portions of the
West, we shall see that our military operations from Green-
brier county, Yirginia, all the way down to Chattanooga,
Tennessee, were conducted with but little vigor. On the
boundaries of East Tennessee, Southwestern Virginia and
Kentucky, we had a force in the aggregate of thirty thousand
men, confronted by probably not half their number of Yankee
troops ; yet the Southwestern counties of Virginia and the
valley of the Clinch, in Tennessee, were entered and mercir
lessly plundered by the enemy in the face of our troops.

But we shall have occasion to notice the campaign in the
West on a broader arena. We shall see how movements in
this direction pressed back the discouraged and retreating foe.
We shall see how these movements of the Confederates were
intended to repossess the country previously occupied by them
and to go forward to the redemption of the State of Kentucky,
and the attack of one or more of the leading cities of the West ;
how, in the prosecution of this plan, North Alabama and Mis-
sissippi were speedily cleared of the footsteps of the foe ; how
all of Tennessee, save the strongholds of Memphis and Kash-
ville, and the narrow districts commanded by them, were
retrieved, and, by converging armies, nearly the whole of Ken-
tucky was occupied and held — and how, at last, all these
achievements were reversed in a night's time, and the most
valuable and critical points abandoned by our troops, or rather
by the will of the unfortunate general who led them.

But our narrative does not yet open on the chequered page
of the West. That important part of our history is prefaced
by the brilliant story of the summer campaign of the upper
Potomac, and is relieved by dazzling lights of glory on the old
battle-grounds of Virginia.

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAK.

CHAPTER m.

Effect of McClellan'8 Defeat ia the North. — Call for more Troops. — Why the North
was not easily dispirited. — The War as a Money Job. — Note: Gen. Washington's
Opinion of New Ensrland. — The Yankee Finances.— Exasperation of Hostilities. — The
Yankee Idea of a " Vigorous Prosecution of the War." — Ascendancy of the Eadicals.
— War Measures at Wasliington. — Anti-Slavery Aspects of the War. — Brutality of the
Yankees. — The Insensibility of Europe. — Yankee Chaplains in Virginia. — Seizures of
Private Property. — Pope's Orders in Virginia. — Steiuwehrs Order respecting Host-
ages.— The Character and Services of Gen. John Pope.— The " Army of Virginia." —
Irruption of the Northern Spoilsmen. — The Yankee Trade in Counterfeit Confederate
Notes. — Pope's " Chasing the Rebel Hordes." — Movement against Pope by " Stone-
wall" Jackson. — Battle of Cedar Mountain. — McClellau recalled from the Penin-
Bula. — The Third Grand Army of the North. — Jacksou's Surprise of the Enemy at
Manassas. — A Rapid and Masterly Movement. — Change of the Situation. — Attack by
the Enemy upon Bristow Station and at Manassas Junction. — Marshalling of the
Hosts. — Longstreet's Passage of Thoroughfare Gap. — The Plans of Gen. Lee. — Spirit
of our Troops. — Their Painful Marches. — The Second Battle of Manassas.— A ter-
rible Bayonet Charge. — Rout of the Enemy. — A hideous Battle-field. — Gen. Lee and
the Summer Campaign of Virginia. — Jackson's Share in it. — Extent of the Great
Victory of Manassas. — Excitement in Washington. — Tlie Yankee Army falls back
upon Alexandria and Washington. — Review of the Situation. — Rapid Change in our
Military Fortunes. — What the South had accomplished. — Comparison of Materiid
Strength between North and South. — Humiliating Result to the Warlike Reputation
of the North.

The effect of the defeat of McClellan before Richmond was
received at the North with ill-concealed mortification and anx-
iety. Beneath the bluster of the newspapers, and the affecta-
tions of public confidence, disappointment, embarrassment and
alarm were perceptible. The people of the North had been so
assured of the capture of Richmond, that it was difiicult to re-
animate them on the heels of McClellan's retreat. The pros-
pects held out to them so long, of ending the war in " sixty
days," " crushing out the rebellion," and eating victorious din-
ners in Richmond, had been bitterly disappointed and were
not to be easily renewed. The government at Washington
showed its appreciation of the disaster its arms had sustained by
making a call for three hundred thousand additional troops ;*

«- The Army Reghter, published at Washington, in its statement of the organ-
ization of the regular army, enumerates as its force six regiments of cavalry, five
of artillery, teu of infantry (old army), and nine of infantry (nevr army).

THE SECOND TEAB OF THE WAE. 83

and the people of the Korth were urged by every variety of
appeal, including large bounties of money, to respond to the
stirring call of President Lincoln.

There is no doubt but that the N'ortli was seriously discour-
aged by the events that had taken place before Richmond.
But it was a remarkable circumstance, uniformly illustrated in
the war, that the North, though easily intoxicated by triumph,
was not in the same proportion depressed by defeat. There is
an obvious explanation for this peculiarity of temper. As
long as the North was conducting the war upon the soil of the
South, a defeat there involved more money expenditure and
more calls for troops ; it involved scarcely any thing else ; it
had no other horrors, it did not imperil their homes ; it might
easily be repaired by time. Indeed, there was some sense in
the exhortation of some of the Northern orators, to the effect
that defeat made their people stronger than ever, because,
while it required them to put forth their energies anew, it en-
abled them to take advantage of experience, to multiply their
means of success, and to essay new plans of campaign. No
one can doubt but that the celebrated Manassas defeat really
strengthened the North ; and doubtless the South would have
realized the same consequence of the second repulse of the ene-
my's movements on Richmond, if it had been attended by the
same conditions on our part of inaction and repose.

It is curious to observe how completely the ordinary aspects
of war were changed and its horrors diminished, with refer-
ence to the North, by the false policy of the South, in keeping

The strength of this branch of the service in men, may be thus stated :

Total commissioned officers, 2,388

Total enlisted, 40,626

Aggregate, 43,014
The figures which are collected below, to show the organization of the volunteer
army of the North, refer to the date of the Register, August 1, 1862.

It appears that at this date there were in the volunteer army of the North
seventy regiments of cavalry, seventy of artillery, and eight hundred and sixty
regiments of infantry.
These startling official figures give the following result :

Total commissioned officers, 39,922

Total rank and file, 1,052,480

Aggregate, 1,092,402

84 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE "WAR.

the theatre of active hostilities within her own borders. Defeat
did not dispirit the North, because it was not brought to her
doors. Where it did not immediately imperil the safety of
the country and homes of the Yankees, where it gave time for
the recovery and reorganization of the attacking party, and
where it required for the prosecution of the war nothing but
more money jobs in Congress and a new raking up of the scum
of the cities, the eflfects of defeat upon the North might well
be calculated to be the exasperation of its passions, the inflam-
mation of its cupidity, and the multiplication of its exertions
to break and overcome the misapplied power of our armies.

Indeed, the realization of the war in the North was, in many
respects, nothing more than that of an immense money job.
The large money expenditure at Washington supplied a vast
fund of corruption ; it enriched the commercial centres of the
North, and by artificial stimulation preserved such cities as
New York from decay ; it interested vast numbers of politi-
cians, contractors, and dissolute public men in continuing the
war and enlarging the scale of its operations ; and, indeed, the
disposition to make money out of the war accounts for much
of that zeal in the North, which was mistaken for political
ardor or the temper of patriotic devotion.*

* The following is an extract from an unpublished letter from Gen. Washing-
ton to Richard Henry Lee, and, as an exposition of the character of the Northei'n
people from a pen sacred to posterity, is deeply interesting. There can be no
doubt of the authenticity of the letter. It has been preserved in the Lee family,
who, though applied to by Bancroft, Irving, and others for a copy for publica-
tion, have hitherto refused it, on the ground that it would be improper to give
to the world a private letter from the Father of his Country reflecting upon any
portion of it while the Union endured. But now, that "these people" have
trampled the Constitution under foot, aestroyed the government of our fathers,
and invaded and desolated Washington's own county in Virginia, there can be
no impropriety in showing his private opinion of the Massachusetts Yankees :

[Copy.]

Camp at Cambridge, Aug. 29, 1775.
Dear Sir: » » ♦

As we have now nearly cbmpleted our lines of defence, we have nothing
more, in my opinion, to fear from the enemy, j)rovided we can keep our men
to their duty, and make them watchful and vigilant ; but it is among the most
difficult tasks I ever undertook in my life, to induce these people to believe that
there is or can be danger, till the bayonet is pushed at their breasts ; not that it
proceeds from any uncommon prowess, but rather from an unaccountable kind
of stupidity in the lower class of these people, which, believe me, prevails but

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 85

But while politicians plundered the government at Washing-
ton, and contractors grew rich in a single day, and a fictitious
prosperity dazzled the eyes of the observer in the cities of the
North, the public finances of the Yankee government had long
ago become desperate. It is interesting at this point to make
a brief summary of the financial condition of the Korth by

too generally among the officers of the Massachusetts part of the army, who are
nearly of the same kidney with the private, and adds not a little to my difficul-
ties, as thei^e is no such thing as getting officers of this stamp to exert them-
selves in carrying orders into execution. To curry favor with the men (by whom
they were chosen, and on whose smiles possibly they may think they may again
rely) seems to be one of the principal objects of their attention. I submit it,
therefore, to your consideration, whether there is, or is not, a propriety in that
resolution of the Congress which leaves the ultimate appointment of all officers
below the rank of general to the governments where the regiments originated,
now the army is become Continental ? To me it appears improper in two points
of view — first, it is giving that power and weight to an individual colony which
ought of right to belong to the whole. Then it damps the spirit and ardor of
volunteers from all but the four New England governments, as none but their
people have the least chance of getting into office. Would it not be better,
therefore, to have the warrants, which the Commander-in-chief is authorized to
give pro tempwe, approved or disapproved by the Continental Congress, or a com-
mittee of their body, which I should suppose in any long recess must always sit ?
In this case, every gentleman will stand an equal chance of being promoted,
according to his merit ; in the other, all offices will be confined to the inhabit-
ants of the four New England governments, which, in my opinion, is impolitic
to a degree. I have made a pretty good slam among such kind of officers as the
Massachusetts government abounds in since I came to this camp, having broken
one colonel and two captains for cowardly behavior in the action on Bunker's
Hill, two captains for drawing more provisions and pay than they had men in
their company, and one for being absent from his post when the enemy appeared
there and burnt a house just by it. Besides these, I have at this time one colo-
nel, one major, one captain, and two subalterns under arrest for trial. In short,
I spare none, and yet fear it will not all do, as these people seem to be too inat-
tentive to every thing but their interest.

******** *

There have been so many great and capital errors and abuses to rectify — so
many examples to make, and so little inclination in the officers of inferior rank
to contribute their aid to accomplish this work, that my life has been nothing
else (since I came here) but one continual round of vexation and fatigue. lu
short, no pecuniary recompense could induce me to undergo what I have ; espe-
cially, as I expect, by showing so little countenance to irregularities and public
abuses as to render myself very obnoxious to a great part of these people. But
as I have already greatly exceeded the bounds of a letter, I will not trouble you
with matters relative to my own feelings.

Your affectionate friend and obedient servant,

(Signed) GEO. WASHINGTON.

Richard Henry Lee, Esq.

86 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

a comparison of its public debt with tlie assets of the govern-
ment.

The debt of the present United States, audited and float-
ing, calculated from data up to June 30, 1862, was at least
$1,300,000,000. The daily expenses, as admitted by the
Chairman of the Committee of "Ways and Means, was between
three and four millions of dollars ; the debt, in one year from
this time, could not be less than two thousand five hundred
millions of dollars.

Under the census of 1860, all the property of every kind
in all the States was estimated at less than $12,500,000,000.
Since the war commenced, the depreciation has been at least
one-fourth — $3,175,000,000. From $9,375,000,000 deduct
the property in the seceded States, at least one-third —
$3,125,000,000 ; — leaving, in the present United States,
$6,250,000,000.

It will thus be seen, that the present debt of the North was
one-fifth of all the property of every kind it possesses ; and in
one year more it would probably be more than one-third. No
people on earth had ever been plunged in so large a debt in
BO short a time. No government in existence had so large a
debt in proportion to the amount of property held by its
people.

In continuing the narrative of the campaign in Yirginia, we
shall have to observe the remarkable exasperation with which
the North re-entered upon this campaign, and to notice many
deeds of blackness which illustrated the temper in which she
determined to prosecute the desperate fortunes of the war.
The military authorities of the North seemed to suppose that
better success would attend a savage war, in which no quarter
was to be given and no age or sex spared, than had hitherto
been secured to such hostilities as are alone recognized to be
lawful by civilized men in modern times. It is not necessary
to comment at length upon this fallacy. Brutality in war was
mistaken for vigor. War is not emasculated by the observ-
ances of civilization ; its vigor and success consist in the
resources of generalship, the courage of troops, the moral
ardors of its cause. To attempt to make up for deficiency
in these great and noble elements of strength by mere brutal
severities — such as pillage, assassination, &c. — is absurd ; it

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 87

reduces the idea of war to the standard of the brigand ; it
offends the moral sentiment of the world, and it excites its
enemy to the last stretch of determined and desperate exertion.

There had long been a party in the North who mistook bru-
tality in war for vigor, and clamored for a policy which was
to increase the horrors of hostilities by arming the slaves, and
making the invaded country of the South the prey of white
brigands and " loyal" negroes. This party was now in the
ascendency. It had already obtained important concessions
from the Washington government. Nine-tenths of tlie legis-
lation of the Yankee Congress had been occupied in some form
or other with the question of slavery. Universal emancipation
in the South, and the utter overthrow of all property, was now
the declared policy of the desperate and demented leaders of
the war. The Confiscation Bill, enacted at the close of the
session of Congress, confiscated all the slaves belonging to
those who were loyal to the South, constituting nine-tenths at
least of the slaves in the Confederate States. In the Border
States occupied by the North, slavery was plainly doomed
under a plan of emancipation proposed by Mr. Lincoln with
the flimsy and ridiculous pretence of compensation to slave-
holders.*

These concessions to the radical party in the North excited
new demands. The rule which was urged upon the govern-
ment, and which the government hastened to accept, was to

* According to the census of 1860 —

Kentucky had 225,490 slaves.

Maryland 87,188 "

Virginia 490,887 '•

Delaware 1,798 "

Missouri 114,965 "

Tennessee 275,784 "

Making in the whole 1,196,112 '•

At the proposed rate of valuation, these would amount to $358,833,600

Add for deportation and colonization $100 each 119,244,533

And we have the enormous sum of $478,078,133

It is scarcely to he supposed that a proposition could be made in good faith, or
that in any event the proposition could be otherwise than worthless, to add this
vast amount to the public debt of the North at a moment when the treasury was
reeling under the enormous expenditures of the war.

88 THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAK.

spare no means, however brutal, to contest the fortunes of the
war, and to adopt every invention of torture for its enemy.
The slaves were to be armed and carried in battalions against
their masters. The invaded country of the South was to be
pillaged, wasted, and burnt ; the Northern troops, like hungry
locusts, were to destroy every thing green ; the people in the
invaded districts were to be laid under contributions, compelled
to do the work of slaves, kept in constant terror of their lives,
and fire, famine, and slaughter were to be the portion of the
conquered. '

Before the eyes of Europe the mask of civilization had been
taken from the Yankee war ; it degenerated into unbridled
butchery and robbery. But the nations of Europe, which
boasted themselves as humane and civilized, had yet no inter-
ference to offer in a war which shocked the senses and appealed
to the common ofiices of humanity. It is to be observed, that
during the entire continuance of the war up to this time, the
British government had acted with reference to it in a spirit
of selfish and inhuman calculation ; and there is, indeed, but
little doubt that an early recognition of the Confederacy by
France was thwarted by the interference of that cold and
sinister government, that ever pursues its ends by indirection,
and perfects its hypocrisy under the specious cloak of extreme
conscientiousness. No greater delusion could have possessed
the people of the South than that the government of England
was friendly to them. That government, which prided itself
on its cold and ingenious selfishness, seemed to have discovered
a much larger source of profit in the continuation of the Amer-
ican war than it could possibly derive from a pacification of
the contest. It was willing to see its operatives starving and
to endure the distress of a '' cotton famine," that it might have
the ultimate satisfaction, which it anticipated, of seeing both
parties in the American war brought to the point of exhaus-
tion, and its own greatness enlarged on the ruins of a hated
commercial rival. The calculation was far-reaching ; it was
characteristic of a government that secretly laughed at all sen-
timent, made an exact science of selfishness, and scorned the
weakness that would sacrifice for any present good the larger
fruits of the future.

This malevolent and venomous spirit of anti-slavery in the

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 89

war pervaded the whole of JSTorthern society. It was not only
the utterance of such mobs as, in New York city, adopted as
their war-cry against the South, " kill all the inhabitants /"
it found expression in the political measures, military orders,
and laws of the government ; it invaded polite society, and
was taught not only as an element of patriotism, but as a vir-
tue of religion. The characteristic religion of New England,
composed of about equal quantities of blasphemy and balder-
dash, went hand in hand with the war. Some of these pious
demonstrations were curious, and bring to remembrance the
fanaticism and rhapsodies of the old Puritans.*

The Yankee army chaplains in Yirginia alternately disgusted
and amused the country with the ferocious rant with which they
sought to inspire the crusade against the South. One of these
pious missionaries in Winchester, after the regular Sunday ser-
vice, announced to the assembled Yankee troops an imaginary
victory in front of Richmond, and then called for " three cheers
and a tiger, and Yankee Doodle." In a sermon preached near
the enemy's camp of occupation, the chaplain proclaimed the
mission of freeing the negroes. He told them they were free,
and that, as the property amassed by their masters was the
fruit of the labors of the blacks, these had the best title to it

• No one affected the peculiarity of the Puritans more than Gov. Andrews, of
Massachusetts. The following pious rant is quoted from one of his speeches at
Worcester ; in blasphemy and bombast it equals any of the fulminations of the
" Pilgrim Fathers" —

♦' I know that the angel of the Lord, one foot on the earth and one on the
sea, will proclaim in unanswerable language, that four millions of bondmen
shall ere long be slaves no longer. We live in a war, not a riot ; as we thought
last year, with a half million in the field against an atrocious and rebellious foe.
Our government now recognizes it as a war, and the President of the United
States, fulminating his war-orders, has blown a blast before which the enemy
must fly. Rebellion must fall, and they who have stood upon the necks of so
many bondsmen shall be swept away, and four million souls rise to immortality,

" Ah, foul tyrants ! do you hear him where he comes ?
Ah, black traitors ! do you know him as he comes ?
In the thunder of the cannon and the roll of the drums,
As we go marching on.

•' Men may die and moulder in the dust —
Men may die and arise again from the dust.
Shoulder to shoulder in the ranks of the just,
Whax God is marching on."

99 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

and should help themselves. At another place, near the scene
of the execution of John Brown for violation of law, sedition,
and murder, a sermon was preached by an army chaplain on
some text enjoining " the mission of proclaiming liberty;" and
the hymn given out and sung was —

"John Brown's body hangs dangling in the air,
Sing glory, glory, hallelujah !"

These, however, were but indications displayed of a spirit in
the North, which, with reference to the practical conduct of the
war, were serious enough.

By a general order of the Washington government, the
military commanders of that government, within the States of
Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Missis-
sippi, Louisiana, Texas, and Arkansas, were directed to seize
and use any property, real or personal, belonging to the in-
habitants of this Confederacy which might be necessary or con-
venient for their several commands, and no provision was made
for any compensation to the owners of private property thus
seized and appropriated by the military commanders of the
enemy.

But it was reserved for the enemy's army in Northern Yir-
ginia to exceed all that had hitherto been known of the savage
cruelty of the Yankees, and to convert the hostilities hitherto
waged against armed forces into a campaign of robbery and
murder against unarmed citizens and peaceful tillers of the
soil.

On the 23d of July, 1862, Gen. Pope, commanding the
forces of the enemy in Northern Virginia, published an order
requiring that " all commanders of any army corps, divisions,
brigades, and detached commands, will proceed immediately
to arrest all disloyal male citizens within their lines, or within
their reach, in rear of their respective commands. Such as
are willing to take the oath of allegiance to the United States,
and will furnish sufficient security for its observance, shall be
permitted to remain at their homes and pursue in good faith
their accustomed avocations. Those who refuse shall be con-
ducted South, beyond the extreme pickets of this army, and be
notified that, if found again anywhere within our lines, or at
any point in rear, they shall be considered spies and subjected

, THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAE. 91

to the extreme rigor of military law. If any person, having
taken the oath of allegiance as above specified, be found to
have violated it, he shall be shot, and his property seized and
applied to the public use."

By another order of Brigadier-general Steinwehr in Pope's
command, it was proposed to hold under arrest the most prom-
inent citizens in the districts occupied by the enemy as hos-
tages, to suffer death in case of any of the Yankee soldiers
being shot by " bushwhackers," by which term was meant the
citizens of the South who had taken up arms to defend their
homes and families.

The "Washington government had found a convenient instru-
ment for the work of villany and brutality with which it pro-
posed to resume the active campaign in Virginia.

With a view to renewed operations against Richmond, large
forces of Yankee troops were massed at Warrenton, Little
Washington and Fredericksburg. Of these forces, entitled the
" Army of Yirginia," the command was given to Maj.-gen.
John Pope, who boasted that he had come from the West,
where " he had only seen the hacks of the enemy."

This notorious Yankee commander was a man nearly forty
years of age, a native of Kentucky, but a citizen of Illinois.
He was born of respectable parents. He was graduated at
West Point in 1842, and served in the Mexican War, where
he was breveted captain.

In 1849 he conducted the Minnesota exploring expedition,
and afterwards acted as topographical engineer in New Mexico,
until 1853, when he was assigned to the command of one of
the expeditions to survey the route of the Pacific railroad. He
distinguished himself on the overland route to the Pacific by
" sinking" artesian wells, and government money to the amount
of a million of dollars. One well was finally abandoned incom-
plete, and afterwards a perennial spring was found by other
parties in the immediate vicinity. In a letter to Jefferson
Davis, then Secretary of War, urging this route to the Pacific,
and the boring these wells. Pope made himself the especial
champion of the South.

In the breaking out of the war. Pope was made a brigadier-
general of volunteers. He held a command in Missouri foi
some time before he became particularly noted. When Gen.

92 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK.

Halleck took charge of the disorganized department, Pope was
placed in command of the District of Central Missouri. He
was afterwards sent to Southeastern Missouri. The cruel dis-
position of the man, of which his rude manners and a vulgar
bearded face, with coarse skin, gave indications, found an
abundant field for gratification in this unhappy State. His
proceedings in Missouri will challenge a comj)arison with the
most infernal record ever bequeathed by the licensed murderer
to the abhorrence of mankind. And yet, it was his first step
in blood — the first opportunity he had ever had to feast his
eyes upon slaughter and regale his ears with the cries of human
agony. ^

Having been promoted to the rank of major-general, Pope
was next appointed to act at the head of a corps to co-operate
with Halleck in the reduction of Corinth. After the evacua-
tion of Corinth by Gen. Beauregard, Pope was sent by Halleck
to annoy the rear of the Confederate army, but Beauregard
turned upon and repulsed his pursuit. The report of Pope to
Halleck, that he had captured 10,000 of Beauregard's army,
and 15,000 stand of arms, when he had not taken a man or a
musket, stands alone in the history of lying. It left him with-
out a rival in that respectable art.

Such was the man who took command of the enemy's forces
in Northern Virginia. His bluster was as excessive as his
accomplishments in falsehood. He was described in a Southern
newspaper as " a Yankee compound of Bobadil and Munchau-
sen." His proclamation that he had seen nothing of his ene-
mies " but their backs," revived an ugly story in his private
life, and gave occasion to the witty interrogatory, if the gen-
tleman who cowhided him for ofiPering an indignity to a lady
was standing with his back to him when he inflicted the clias-
tisemeut. The fact was, that Pope had won his baton of marshal
by bragging to the Yankee fill. He was another instance,
besides that of Butler, how easily a military reputation might
be made in the North by bluster, lying, and acts of coarse
cruelty to the defenceless. On what monstrous principles he
commenced his career in Virginia, and what orders he issued,
are still fresh in the public memory.

" 1 desire you to dismiss from your minds certain phrases
(said Pope to his army), which I am sorry to find much in vogue

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 93

among yon. I hear constantly of taking strong positions and
holding them; of lines of retreat and bases of supplies. Let
us discard such ideas. The strongest position a soldier should
desire to occupy is the one from which he can most easily ad-
vance upon the enemy. Let us study the probable line of re-
treat of our opponents, and leave our own to take care of itself.
Let us look before, and not behind. Disaster and shame lurk
in the rear."

On establishing his headquarters at Little "Washington, the
county seat of Rappahannock, Pope became a source of mingled
curiosity and dread to the feeble villagers. They were in a
condition of alarm and anguish from the publication of his
order, to banish from their homes all males who should refuse
to take the Yankee oath of allegiance. Dr. Bispliaw of the
village was deputed to wait upon the Yankee tyrant, and ask
that the barbarous order be relaxed.

He painted, at the same time, the agony of the women and
children, and stated that the effect would be to place six new
regiments in the rebel service. " "We can't take the oath of
allegiance," said the Doctor, " and we won't — man, woman, or
child — but we will give a parol to attend to our own business,
afford no communication with the South, and qui^ly stay upon
our premises."

" I shall enforce the order to the letter," said Gen. Pope. " I
did not make it without deliberation, and if you don't take the
oath you shall go out of my lines."

In the short period in which Pope's army was uninterrupted
in its career of robbery and villany in Northern Virginia,
every district of country invaded by him,- or entered by his
marauders, was ravaged as by a horde of barbarians. This
portion of Virginia will long bear the record and tradition of
the irruption of the Northern spoilsmen. The new usage
which had been instituted in regard to protection of Confed-
erate property, and the purpose of the Washington government
to subsist its troops upon the invaded country, converted the
"Army of Virginia" into licensed brigands, and let loose upon
the country a torrent of unbridled and unscrupulous robbers.
The Yankee troops appropriated remorselessly whatever came
within their reach. They rushed in crowds upon the smoke-
houses of the farmers. On the march throuo^h a section of

94 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

country, every spring-hoiTse was broken open ; butter, milk,
eggs, and cream were ingulfed ; calves and sheep, and, in
fact, any thing and every thing serviceable for meat, or drink,
or apparel, were not safe a moment after the approach of the
Yankee plunderers. Wherever they camped at night, it would
be found the next morning that scarcely an article, for which
the fertility of a soldier could suggest the slightest use, remained
to the owner. Pans, kettles, dishcloths, pork, poultry, provisions,
and every thing desirable had disappeared. The place was strip-
ped, and without any process of commissary or quartermaster.

Whenever the Yankee soldiers advanced into a new section,
the floodgates were immediately opened, and facsimile Con-
federate notes (this spurious currency being manufactured in
Philadelphia, and sold by public advertisement for a few centa
to Yankee soldiers) were poured out upon the land.* They
were passed indiscriminately upon the unsuspecting inhabitants,
poor as well as rich, old and young, male and female. In fre-
quent instances, this outrage was perpetrated in return for kind
nursing by poor, aged women.

These spurious notes passed readily, and seemed to be taken
gladly for whatever was held for sale. Bank-notes and shin-
plasters were given for change. Horses and other valuable
property were often purchased with this bogus currency. A
party of Yankee soldiers entered a country store, fortified with
exhaustless quantities of Philadelphia Confederate notes, and

* The Northern trade in this counterfeit money was open and undisguised ;
enticing advertisements of its profit were freely made in the Northern journals,
and circulars were distributed through the Federal army proposing to supply the
troops with "rebel" currency almost at the price of the paper on which the
counterfeit was executed. We copy below one of these circulars found on the
person of a Yankee prisoner ; the curiosity being a court paper in the possession
of Mr. Commissioner Watson, of Richmond :

" $20 Confederate Bond ! ! I have this day issued a facsimile $20 Confederate
Bond— making, in all, fifteen different /ac-«'w8j7e Rebel Bonds, Notes, Shinplasters,
and Postage Stamps, issued by me the past three months.

"Trade supplied at 50 cents per 100, or $4 per 1,000. All orders by mail or
express promptly executed.

^° " All orders to be sent by mail must be accompanied with 18 cents in post-
age stamps, in addition to the above price, to prepay the postage on each 100
ordered. Address, S. C. Upham,

403 Chesnut Street, Philadelphia.

" N. B.— I shall have a $100 Rebel Note out this week."

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAK. 95

commenced trade. Forty pounds of sugar was first ordered,
and the storekeeper, pleased with the sudden increase of busi-
ness, called in his wife to assist in putting up the order in small
parcels. Seventy -five cents a pound was the cost. That was a
small matter. Matches were purchased. Twenty-five cents
per box was the charge. Tobacco also found a ready market.
Each man provided himself with a straw hat ; but the crown-
ing act of all was the abstraction from the till of money
already paid to the dealer for his goods, and the purchase of
more goods with the same spuriotis medium.

Such acts of villany and the daily robberies committed by
Pope's soldiers were very amusing to the Northern people, and
gave them a stock of capital jokes. " I not long ago saw,"
wrote a correspondent of a Yankee newspaper, " a dozen sol-
diers rushing headlong through a field, each anxious to get the
first choice of three horses shading themselves quietly under a
tree. The animals made their best time into the farthest cor-
ner of the field with the men close upon them, and the fore-
most men caught their prizes and bridled them as if they had
a perfect immunity in such sort of things. A scene followed.
A young lady came out and- besought the soldiers not to take
her favorite pony. The soldiers were remorseless and unyield-
ing, and the pony is now in the army."

It is not within the design of these pages to pursue the sto-
ries of outrage, villany, and barbarism of the enemy's army
in Virginia ; but with what we have said, intended only to
show the spirit of that army and the character of its leader,
we shall hasten to describe the series of events which, at last,
confronted it with an army of avengers on the historic Plains
of Manassas, and culminated there in a victory, which liber-
ated Virginia from its invaders, broke the " line of the Poto-
mac" from Leesburg to Harper's Ferry, and opened an avenue
for the first time into the territory of the North.

THE BATTLE OF CEDAR MOUNTAIN.

The Northern newspapers declared that Pope was right
when he said that he was accustomed to see the backs of his
enemy, and were busy in assuring their readers that his only
occupation was to chase " the rebel hordes." It was said that

96 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE 'WAR.

lie had penetrated as far as Madison Court-house without see-
ing any enemy. The Southern troops, it was prophesied, would
keep on their retreat beyond the Virginia Central railroad
Pope's army was now as far in the interior, by overland
marchfes, as any of the Yankee troops had ever been. The
position of his advance was described as about ten miles east
of Port Republic, with an eye on the Shenandoah Yalley ; and
it was boasted that the second Napoleon of the Yankees had
already complete possession of the country north of the Papi-
dan river, and only awaited his leisure to march upon Rich-
mond.

These exultations were destined to a sharp and early disap-
pointment. The Confederate authorities in Richmond knew
that it was necessary to strike somewhere before the three hup-
dred thousand recruits called for by the Washington govern-
ment should be brought to the field to overwhelm them. It
was necessary to retain in the strong works around Richmond
a sufficient force to repulse any attack of McClellan's army;
but at the same time the necessity was clear to hold Pope's
forces in check and to make an active movement against him.
The execution of this latter purpose was intrusted to Jackson,
the brave, eccentric, and beloved commander,* who had
achieved so many victories against so many extraordinary
odds and obstacles ; all the movements of the campaign being
directed by the self-possessed, controlling, and earnest mind of
Gen. Lee.

The insolent enemy received his first lesson at the hands of

♦There have been a great many pen and ink portraits of the famous "Stonewall"
Jackson ; the singular features and eccentric manners of this popular hero aflford-
ing a fruitful subject of description and anecdote. A gentleman, who was known
to be a rare and quick judge of character, was asked by the writer for a descrip-
tion of Jackson, whom he had met but for a few moments on the battle-field.
" He is a fighting man," was the reply; "rough mouth, iron jaw, and nostrils
big as a horse's." This description has doubtless much force in it, although
blunt and homely in its expression. The impression given by Jackson is that
of a man perhaps forty years old, six feet high, medium size, and somewhat
angular in person. He has yellowish- gray eyes, a Eoman nose, sharp ; a thin,
forward chin, angular brow, a close mouth, and light brown hair. The expres-
sion of his face is to some extent unhappy, but not sullen or unsocial. He is
impulsive, silent, and emphatic. His dress is official, but very plain, his cap-front
resting nearly on his nose. His tall horse diminished the effect of his size, so
that when mounted he appears less in person than he really is

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK. ,97

the heroic Jackson, on the wooded sides and cleared slopes of
the mountainous country in Culpepper. In consequence of the
advance of the Confederates beyond the Rapidan, Major-gen.
Pope had sent forward two army corps, commanded by Gen.
Banks, to hold them in check.

On the evening of the 8th of August, a portion of Gen.
Jackson's division, consisting of the 1st, 2d, and 3d brigades,
under the command of Gen. Charles S. Winder, crossed the
Rapidan river, a few miles above the railroad, and, having
advanced a mile into Culpepper county, encamped for the night.
The next morning, the enemy being reported as advancing, our
forces, EwelFs division being in advance, moved forward on
the main road from Orange Court-house to Culpepper Court-
house, about three miles, and took position — our left flank rest-
ing on the Southwest Mountain, and our artillery occupying
several commanding positions. At 12 m., our forces commenced
cannonading, which was freely responded to by the enemy,
who did not seem ready for the engagement, which they had
affected to challenge. Indeed, some strategy seemed necessary
to bring them to fight. About 3 p. m.. Gen. Early's brigade
(Ewell's division) made a circuit through the woods, attacking
the enemy on their right flank, the 13th Virginia regiment be-
ing in the advance as skirmishers. At 4 o'clock the firing be-
gan, and soon the fight became general. As Gen. Jackson's
division, then commanded by Gen.. Winder, was rapidly pro-
ceeding to the scene of action, the enemy, guided by the dust
made by the artillery, shelled the road with great precision.
It was by this shell that the brave Winder was killed. His
left arm shattered, and his side also wounded, he survived but
an hour. At a still later period, a portion of Gen. A. P. Hill's
division was engaged. The battle was mainly fought in a
large field near Mrs. Crittenden's house, a portion being open,
and the side occuj^ied by the Yankees being covered with lux-
uriant corn. Through this corn, when our forces were consid-
erably scattered, two Yankee cavalry regiments made a desper-
ate charge, evidently expecting utterly to disorganize our lines.
The result was precisely the reverse. Our men rallied, ceased
to fire on the infantry, and, concentrating their attention on
the cavalry, poured into their ranks a fire which emptied many
a saddle, and caused the foe to wheel and retire, which, how-

7

98 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

ever, they eiFected without breaking their columns. For some
time the tide of victory ebbed and flowed, but about dark the
foe finally broke and retreated in confusion to the woods, leav-
ing their dead and many of their wounded, with a large quan
tity of arms and ammunition, upon the field. Dayh'ght faded,
and the moon in her full glory appeared, just as the terrors of
the raging battle gave way to the sickening scenes of a field
where a victory had been won.

The battle of Cedar Mountain, as it was entitled, may be
characterized as one of the most rapid and severe engagements
of the war. In every particular it was a sanguinary and des-
perate struggle, and resulted in a complete and decisive victory
for our arms. Our forces engaged amounted to about eight
thousand, while those of the enemy could not have been less
than fifteen tliousand. Our loss was near six hundred killed,
wounded, and missing ; that of the enemy little, if any, less than
two thousand. "We captured nearly five hundred prisoners, over
fifteen hundred stand of arms, two splendid Napoleon guns,
twelve wagon-loads of ammunition, several wagon-loads of new
and excellent clothing, and drove the enemy two miles beyond
the field of battle, which we held for two days and nights.

The battle was remarkable for an extraordinary and terrific
"artillery duel." In fact, the fire was conducted with artil-
lery alone for more than three hours. The opposing batteries
unlimbered so close to each other that, during the greater part
of the firing, they used grape and canister. Those working
our battery could distinctly hear the hum of voices of the in-
fantry support of the Federal battery. The Louisiana Guard
artillery and the Purcell battery were ordered to take position
and open on the enemy from the crest of a hill. Here they
found themselves opposed by five batteries of the enemy within
short range. The battle raged fiercely, the enemj'' firing with
great precision. The accuracy of our fire was proved by the
fact that the enemy, though their guns were more than twice
as numerous, were compelled to shift the position of their bat-
teries five different times. Once during the fight, the enemy's
sharpshooters, under cover of a piece of woods, crept up within
a short distance of our batteries and opened on them, but were
instantly scattered by a discharge of canister from one of the
howitzers.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 99

The battle of Cedar Mountain was the natural preface to
that larger and severer contest of arms which was to baptize,
for a second time, the field of Manassas with the blood of
Southern patriots, and illuminate it with the splendid scenes
of a decisive victory. It convinced the Korth of the necessity
of a larger scale of exertion and a concentration of its forces
in Virginia to effect its twnce-foiled advance upon the capital
of the Confederacy. It was decided by the Washington gov-
ernment to recall McClellan's army from the Peninsula, to
unite his columns with those of Pope, to include also the forces
at Fredericksburg, and, banding these in a third Grand Army
more splendid than its predecessors, to make one concentrated
endeavor to retrieve its unfortunate summer campaign in Vir-
ginia, and plant its banners in the city of Richmond.

Not many days elapsed before the evacuation of Berkeley
and Westover, on the James river, was signalled to the au-
thorities of Richmond by the large fleet of transports collected
on the James and the Rappahannock. It became necessary to
meet the rapid movements of the enemy by new dispositions of
our forces ; not a day was to be lost; and by the 17th of Au-
gust, General Lee had assembled in front of Pope a force suffi-
cient to contest his further advance, and to balk his threatened
passage of the Rapidan.

After the battle of Cedar Mountain, the forces under Stone-
wall Jackson withdrew from the vicinity of the Rapidan, and
were for some days unheard of, except that a strong force was
in the vicinity of Madison Court-house, some twelve miles to
the westward, in the direction of Luray and the Shenandoah
valley ; but it was supposed by the enemy that this was only a
wing of the army under Ewell, intended to act as reserves to
Jackson's army, and to cover his retreat back to Gordonsville.
Not so, however. Those forces of Ewell, as afterwards dis-
covered by the Yankees to their great surprise, were the main
body of Jackson's army, en route for the Shenandoah valley.

It was probably the design of Gen. Lee, with the bulk of
the Confederate army, to take the front, left, and right, and
engage Gen. Pope at or near the Rapidan, while Jackson and
Ewell were to cross the Shenandoah river and mountains, cut
off his supplies by way of the railroad, and menace his rear.
The adventure, on the part of Jackson, was difficult and des-

Loi t

100 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE.

perate ; it took the risk of any new movements of Pope, by
which he (Jackson) himself might be cut off. It was obvious,
indeed, that if Pope could reach Gordonsville, he would cut off
Jackson's supplies, but in this direction he was to be confronted
by Gen. Lee with the forces withdrawn from Richmond. With
the movement of Jackson the object was to keep Pope between
the Rapidan and the Rappahannock rivers until Jackson had
attained his position at Manassas, or perhaps at Rappahannock
bridge ; but Pope's retreat to the Rappahannock's north bank
frustrated that design, and rendered it necessary for General
Lee to follow up his advantage, and, by a system of feints, to
take Pope's attention from his rear and divert it to his front.
—-On Monday, the 2Cth of August, at daybreak. Gen. Jack-
son's corps, consisting of Gen. Ewell's division. Gen. Hill's
division, and Gen. Jackson's old division, under command of
Gen. Taliaferro, and a force of cavalry under Gen. Stuart,
marched from Jeffersonton, in Culpepper county, and crossed
the Rappahannock eight miles above that place, and marched
by Orleans to Salem, in Fauquier. The next day they passed
through Thoroughfare Gap, of Bull Run Mountains, to Bristow
and Manassas stations, on the Orange and Alexandria railroad,
effecting a complete surprise of the enemy, capturing a large
number of prisoners, several trains of cars, and immense com-
missary and quartermaster stores, and several pieces of artil-
lery. The distance marched in these two days was over fifty
miles. On Wednesday, Manassas station. was occupied by
Jackson's old division, while Ewell occupied Bristow, and Hill
and Stuart dispersed the force sent from Alexandria to attack
what the enemy supposed to be only a cavalry force.

The amount of property which fell into our hands at Manas-
sas was immense — several trains heavily laden with stores, ten
first-class locomotives, fifty thousand pounds of bacon, one
thousand barrels of beef, two thousand barrels of pork, several
thousand barrels of flour, and a large quantity of oats and corn.
A bakery, which was daily turning out fifteen thousand loaves
of bread, was also destroyed. Next to Alexandria, Manassaa
was probably the largest depot established for the Northern
army in Yirginia. '^

The movement of Jackson, which we have briefly sketched,
18 the chief element of the situation in which the decisive en-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 101

gagements of Manassas were fonglit. In tins connection it
mnst be studied ; it was the brilliant strategic preface to the
most decisive victory yet achieved on the theati-e of the war.
The corps of Jackson, having headed off the Federal army
under Pope, had now possession of Manassas Plains. It had
accomplished its design, which was to force Pope back — de-
prive him completely of direct communication with Washing-
ton or Alexandria, and eventually induce his surrender or an-
nihilation.

The principal and anxious topic in the North was, by what
eccentric courses the famous Confederate commander had man-
aged to get around the right wing of Pope's army, when it was
supposed — and in fact the hasty exultation had already been
caught up in the Yankee newspapers — tliat it was the " rebel"
general who was cut off, and that he would probably make a
desperate retreat into the mountains to escape the terrors of
Pope. Indeed, it was some time before the full and critical
meaning of the situation dawned upon the prejudiced mind of
the Northern public. The idea was indulged that the capture
of Manassas was only a successful raid by a body of rebel
guerillas ; and so it was dismissed by the newspapers, with a
levity characteristic of their insolence and ignorance.

Weak and credulous as Gen. Pope was, it is probable that
the moment he heard that Jackson was in his rear, he was
satisfied that it was no raid. The situation had been changed
almost in a moment. Pope had evacuated Warrenton Junc-
tion, and was moving along the railroad upon Manassas, anx-
ious to secure his "line of retreat," and expecting, doubtless,
with no little confidence, by rapid marches of a portion of his
forces by the turnpike upon Gainesville, to intercept any rein-
forcements by the way of Tlioroughfare Gap to Jackson, and
to fall upon and crush him by the weight of numbers. A por-
tion of the Confederate army now fronted to the South, and the
Federal army towards Washington. The latter had been swol-
len by reinforcements, and the advance corp^ from Burnside
was marching on rapidly from Fredericksburg to complete the
amassment on the Federal side.

Although the situation of Gen. Pope was one unexpected by
himself, and surrounded by many embarrassments, he yet had
many circumstances of advantage in which to risk a gi eat and

102 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

d<»ci8ive battle. The New York journals persisted in declaring
tl at it was not the infallible Pope, but the " rebel" army that
was " in a tight place." At any rate, Pope was not in the
situation in which McClellan found himself when his right wing
was turned by the Confederates in front of Richmond — that
is, without supports or reinforcements. On the contrary, on
his right, and on the way up from Fredericksburg, was the
new army of the Potomac under Burnside : while advancing
forward from Alexandria was the newly organized army Ot
Virginia under McClellan. Such was the array of force that
threatened the army we had withdrawn from Richmond, and
in which the Northern populace indulged the prospect of a
certain and splendid victory.

An encounter of arms of vital consequence was now to en-
sue on the already historic and famous Plains of Manassas —
the beautiful stretch of hill and dale reaching as far as Cen-
treville, varied by amphitheatres — an admirable battle ground ;
with the scenery of which the Southern troops associated the
exciting thoughts of a former victory and a former shedding
of the blood of their beloved and best on the memorable and
consecrated spots that marked the iield of battle.

THE ENGAGEMENT OF WEDNESDAY, THE TWENTY-SEVENTH OF AUGUST.

On "Wednesday, the 27th, an attack was made by the enemy
upon Bristow station, and also at Manassas Junction.

On the morning of that day, at about eleven o'clock, Gen.
Taylor's brigade, of Major-gen. Slocum's division of the
army of the Potomac, consisting of the first, second, third,
and fourth New Jersey regiments, were ordered to proceed to
Manassas by rail from their camp near Fort Ellsworth, Alex-
andria.

The brigade arrived at Bull Run bridge about seven o'clock
in the morning. The troops landed and crossed the bridge
with as little delay as possible, and marched towards Manassas.
After ascending the hill emerging from the valley of Bull Run,
they encountered a line of skirmishers of the Confederates,
which fell back before them. The brigade marched on in the
direction of Manassas, not seeing any of the enemy until within
range of the circular series of fortifications around the Junction,

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 103

when heavy artillery was opened upon them frcm all direc-
tions. Gen. Taylor retired beyond the range of our guns to
the rear of a sheltering crest of ground, from which he was
driven by our infantry. Crossing at Blackburn's ford, he was
pursued by our horse artillery, which fired into him, creating
the utmost havoc. The brigade retreated in a disorganized
mass of flying men towards Fairfax ; it was pursued by our
eager troops beyond Centreville, and the track of the flying
and cowardly enemy was marked with his dead.

The flight of the enemy was attended by the most wild and
terrible scenes, as he was pursued by our horse artillery, pour-
ing canister into his ranks. The brigade was almost annihi-
lated. Gen. Taylor himself, his son on his stafl", and his nephew,
were wounded ; also one-half of his officers.

At 3 o'clock, p. M., of the same day, the enemy attacked
Gen. Ewell, at Bristow, and that general, after a handsome
little fight, in which he punished the enemy severely, retired
across Muddy Run, as had previously been agreed upon, to
Manassas Junction. This attack was made by the division of
the enemy commanded by Gen. Hooker, which was dispatched
to that point and detached from the advancing forces of Pope,
who, of course, claimed the result of the aSair as a signal
Federal success.

MOVEMENTS OF THUESDAY, THE TWENTY-EIGHTH OF AUGUST.

After sunset, on Thursday, Gen. Jackson accomplished one
of the most beautiful and masterly strategic movements of the
war. He found himself many miles in advance of the rest of
our army. The enemy might throw his immense columns be-
tween him and Longstreet — Alexandria and Washington was
to his rear when he turned to attack the enemy. He deter-
mined to throw himself upon the enemy's flank, to preserve
the same nearness to Alexandria, to place himself within sup-
port of the remainder of our army, and to occupy a position
from which he could not be driven, even if support did not ar-
rive in time. All this he accomplished that night, after de-
stroying the stores, buildings, cars, &c., and burning the rail-
rofwl bridges over Muddy Run and Bull Run. He marched at
nig) it with his entire force from Manassas station to Manassas

104 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAE.

battle-field, crossing tlie "Warrenton turnpike, and placing his
troops in such position that he could confront the enemy should
they attempt to advance by the Warrenton pike or by the Sud-
ley road and ford, and have the advantage of communicating
by the Aldie road with Longstreet, should he not have passed
the Thoroughfare Gap, and at all events gain for himself a
safe position for attack or defence. At seven o'clock, a. m.,
on Friday, Gen. Stuart encountered the enemy's cavalry near
Gainesville, on the Warrenton pike, and drove them back ;
and during the morning the 2d brigade of Gen. Taliaferro's
division, under Colonel Bradley Johnson, again repulsed them.
It was now ascertained that the enemy's column was advancing
(or retreating) from Warrenton, along the line of the I'ailroad
and by way of the Warrenton turnpike, and that they intended
to pass a part of their force over the Stone bridge and Sudley
ford. Gen. Jackson immediately ordered Gen. Taliaferro to
advance with his division to attack their left flank, which was
advancing towards Sudley Mill. Gen. Ewell's division marched
considerably in the rear of the 1st division. After marching
some three miles, it was discovered that the enemy had aban-
doned the idea of crossing at Sudley, and had left the War-
renton pike to the left, beyond Groveton, and were apparently
cutting across to the railroad through .the fields and woods.
In a few minutes, however, he advanced across the turnpike to
attack us, and Jackson's army was thrown forward to meet
him.

From this sketch of the movements of the corps commanded
by Gen. Jackson, it will be seen that though a portion of our
forces, under Gens. Ewell and Jackson, were on Tuesday and
a part of Wednesday, the 26th and 27th of August, on the
Grange and Alexandria raih-oad, between Pope and Alexandria,
on the approach of Pope from Warrenton they withdrew to the
west, and halted in the vicinity of the Warrenton turnpike, ex-
pecting to be rejoined by Longstreet, where they awaited the
approach of the enemy and delivered him battle.

THE BATTLE OF FRIDAY, THE TWKNTY-NINTH OF AUGUST.

Tlie conflict of Friday occurred near the village of Groveton,
our right resting just above and near the village, and the left

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR. 105

upon the old battle-field of Manassas. The division of Gen.
Anderson liad not yet arrived, and the corps of Longstree^ had
not been fully placed in position. The enemy, probably aware
of our movements, selected this opportunity to make an attack
upon Jackson, hoping thereby to turn our left, destroy our
combinations, and disconcert the plans which had already be-
'jorae apparent to the Federal commanders.

Gen, Longstreet's passage of the Thoroughfare Gap, in the
face of a force of two thousand of the enemy, is one of the
most remarkable incidents of the late operations in Northern
Yirginia. The Gap is a wild, rude opening through the Bull
Run Mountains, varying in width from one hundred to two
hundred yards. A rapid stream of water murmurs over the
rocks of the rugged defile, along which runs a stony winding
road. On either side arise the mountains, those on the left
presenting their flat, precipitous fjices to the beholder, with
here and there a shrub jutting out and relieving the monoto-
nous gray of the rocky mass ; and those on the right covered
thickl}^ witli timber, impassable to any but the most active men.
The strong position afforded by this pass, which might have
been held against almost any force by a thousand determined
troops and a battery of artillery, had been possessed by the
enemy, who had planted his batteries at various points and
lined the sides of the mountains with his skirmishers. As it
was, the passage was effected by Longstreet's division with the
loss of only three men wounded. Tliis result was accomplished
by a decisive piece of strategy, by which a small column of
three brigades — Pryor's, Wilcox's and Featherstone's, and two
batteries of rifle pieces — were thrown through Hopewell Gap,
some three miles to the left of Thoroughfare Gap, as we ap-
proached Manassas.

Under Jackson and Longstreet, the details of the plan of
Gen. Lee had been so far carried out in every respect. For
ten days or more the troops of both of these generals in the
advance were constantly under fire. The former had been en-
gaged in no less than four serious fights. Many of the men
were barefooted, in rags; provided with only a single blanket
as a protection against the heavy dews and severe cold at night ;
frequently they would get nothing from daylight to daylight ;
rations at best consisted of b-read and water, with a rare and

106 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

economical intermingling of bacon ; and the troops were in
what at any other time they would have characterized as a suf-
fering condition. Notwitlistanding these adverse circumstances
not a murmur of complaint had been heard ; marches of twenty
and in one instance of thirty, miles a day had been patiently
endured, and the spirit of the army, so far from being broken,
was elevated to a degree of enthusiasm which foreboded nothins:
but the victory it won.

On the morning of the 29th, the "Washington Artillery of
New Orleans and several other batteries were planted upon a
high hill that commanded the extensive ground over which the
enemy were advancing, and just in front of this, perhaps a
little to the left, the tight began. The Federals threw forward
a heavy column, supported by field batteries, and under cover
of their tire made a bold stroke to divide our line. The blow
fell upon a portion of Ewell's troops, who were concealed be-
hind the embankment of a raih'oad ; but no sooner had the
enemy appeared within close range, than they received a ter-
ribly galling tire, which drove them panic-stricken from that
portion of the field. As they ran, our artillery opened upon
the flying mass with shell and round shot. Every ball could
be seen taking efifect. The enemy fell by scores, until finally
the once beautiful line melted confusedly into the woods. Again
they renewed the attack, and gradually the fight became gen-
eral along nearly the entire column of Jackson.

As the afternoon progressed, however. Gen. Lee discovered
that strong Yankee reinforcements were coming up, and he
accordingly ordered the division of Gen. Hood, belonging to
Longstreet's corps, to make a demonstration on the enemy's
left. This was done, perhaps an hour before dark, and the
moment they became engaged the difference became percep-
tible at a glance. Jackson, thus strengthened, fought with re-
newed vigor, and the enemy, not knowing the nature of the
reinforcements, and diverted by our onset, whicli compelled
him to change his lines, was proportionately weakened. The
result was, that at dark Hood's division had driven the forces
in front of them three-quarters of a mile from our starting-
point, and, had it not been for the lateness of the hour, might
have turned the defeat into an utter rout.

The conflict had been terrific. Our troops were advanced

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE "WAK. 107

several times during the fight, but the enemy fought with des-
peration, and did not retire until nine o'clock at night, when
they sullenly left the field to the Confederates. During the
night orders came from head-quarters for our troops to fall back
to their original positions, preparatory to our renewal of the
action in the morning. It might have been this simple retro-
grade movement which led to the mendacious dispatch sent by
Pope to Washington, stating that he had whipped our army,
and driven us from the field,* but confessing that the Federal
loss was eight thousand in killed and wounded. .

THE BATTLE OF SATUKDAT, THE THIRTIETH OF AIJGTJST.

Tlie grand day of the prolonged contest was yet to dawn.
For two days each wing of our army under Generals Long-
street and Jackson had repulsed with vigor attacks made on
them separately. Gen. Pope had concentrated the greater
portion of the army under his command for a desperate re-
newal of the attack on our lines. Friday night found those of
our men who were not engaged in burying the dead and bring-
ing away the wounded, sleeping upon their arms. All the
troops of Longstreet's corps, with the exception of Gen. R. 11.
Anderson's, which was only three or four miles in the rear, had
taken their places in the line of battle, and every one looked
forward to the events of the coming day, the anticipations of
which had sustained our soldiers under the terrible fatigue,
discomforts, and deprivations of the ten days' tedious march,
by which reinforcements had at last reached the heroic and
unyielding Jackson.

"With the first streak of davlie^ht visible throuo^h the LVht
mist that ascended from the woods, our men were under arms.
Tlie pickets of the two armies were within a few hundred yards
of each other. Every circumstance indicated that the battle
would commence at an early hour in the morning. The waking

* It appears that Gen. R. H. Anderson's division, which came down the turn-
pike on their way to Sudley Church, wliere they had been ordered the day be-
fore, were stopped by our pickets, and told that tlie enemy were in strong force
immediately in front. The general countermarched his division, wagons, and
artillery, and fell back in rear of Longstreet for the night. It is probable that
the enemy, seeing this, supposed it to be the falling back of our whole army.

108 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE "WAR.

of a portion of our batteries into life soon after daylight, and
the frequent cannonading thereafter, the ahnost incessant skir-
misliing in front, with its exciting volleys of musketry, all
conspired to produce this impression.

Our line of battle was an obtuse crescent in shape, and at
least five miles long. Jackson's line, which formed our left,
stretched from Sudley, on Bull Run, along the partly exca-
vated track of the Manassas Independent line of raih-oad, for a
portion of the way, and thence towards a point on the Warren-
ton turnpike, about a mile and a half in rear or west of Grove-
ton. His extreme right came within about six hundred yards
of the turnpike.

Longstreet's command, which formed our right wing, ex-
tended from the point near the turnpike on which Jackson's
right flank rested, and prolonged the line of battle far to the
right, stretching beyond the line of the Manassas Gap railroad.

It is thus seen that a point on the Warren ton turnpike, a
mile and a half west of Groveton, was the centre of our posi-
tion, and the apex of our crescent, whose convexity was to-
wards the west It was here, in an interval between Jackson's
right and Longstreet's left that our artillery was placed. Eight
batteries were planted on a commanding elevation.

The enemy's line of battle conformed itself to ours, and took,
therefore, a crescent form, of which the centre or more ad-
vanced portion was at Groveton, whence the wings declined
obliquely to the right and left. Their batteries were in rear
of their infantry, and occupied the hills which they had held
in the fight of July, 1861, but pointed differently. -

Tlie disposition of the enemy's forces was. Gen. Heintzel-
man on the extreme right and Gen. McDowell on the extreme
left, while the army corps of Generals Fitz John Porter and
Seigel, and Reno's division of Gen. Burnside's army, were
placed in the centre.

The elevation occupied by our artillery, under command of
Col. Stephen D. Lee, of South Carolina, was the most com-
manding ground that could have been selected for the purpose.
It was about the centre of the entire army. To the front, the
land breaks beautifully into hill and darle, forming a sort of
amphitheatre. Around the field, and occasionally shooting
into it in narrow bauds, are heavy woods.

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAK. 109

Early in the morning the immense masses of the enemy's
infantry were seen in line of battle, and far in the distance
immense clouds of dust filled the heavens. During this time
our batteries were pitching their shot and shell into the Fed-
eral ranks, and returning the fire of their artillery on the brow
of an opposite hill. Sometimes it was fierce, but generally it
was a deliberate interchange of fire.

About 1 A. M. a regiment advanced rapidly on the enemy's
left, determined to drive out our pickets from an orchard,
where all the morning they had been keeping np a brisk fire.
This effort succeeded, and our brave sharpshooters retired
through the orchard in good order. As soon as they got well
out of the way, our batteries opened upon the enemy, and in
ten minutes they were retreating, sheltering themselves in the
ravines and behind a barn. At 3 o'clock the forces that, had
been moving almost the w^liole day towards our left, began to
move in the opposite direction, and it appeared that they were
retiring towards Manassas, two or three miles distant. Several
attempts were now made to advance upon our left like those
to drive in our pickets on our right, but a few shells served to
scatter the skirmishers and drive them into the woods that
skirted this beautiful valley on either hand. "When it appeared
more than probable that the enemy, foiled in his attempt to
make us bring on the fight by these little advances on our
right and left, was about to retire, and merely kept up the can-
nonading in order to conceal his retreat, suddenly, at 4 p. m.,
there belched forth from every brazen throat in our batteries a
volley that seemed to shake the very earth.

It was at this instant that the battle was joined. As the
sporting whirls of smoke drifted away the cause of the tumult
was at once discerned. A dense column of infantry, several
thousand strong, which had been massed behind and near a
strip of woods, had moved out to attack Jackson, whose men
were concealed behind an excavation on the railroad. As soon
as they were discovered our batteries opened with tremendous
power, but the Federals moved boldly forward, until they came
within the range of our small-arms, where for fully fifteen
minutes they remained desperately engaged with our infantry.
As the fight progressed, a second line emerged from the cover
and went to the support of those in front, and finally a third

110 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAK.

line marched out into the open field below us and there halted,
hesitated, and soon commenced firing over the heads of their
comrades beyond.

Jackson's infantry raked these three columns terribly. Re-
peatedly did they break and run, and rally again under the
energetic appeals of tlieir officers, for it was a crack corps of
the Federal army — that of Generals Sykes and Morrell ; but
it was not in human nature to stand unflinchingly before that
hurricane of fire. As the fight progressed, Lee moved his bat-
teries to the left, until reaching a position only four hundred
yards distant from the enemy's lines, he opened again. The
spectacle was now magnificent. As shell after shell burst in
the wavering ranks, and round shot ploughed broad gaps among
them, one could distinctly see tlirough the rifts of smoke the
Federal soldiers falling and flying on every side. With the
explosion of every bomb, it seemed as if scores dropped dead,
or writhed in agony upon the field. Some were crawling on
their hands and knees ; some were piled up together ; and some
were lying scattered around in every attitude that imagination
can conceive.

Presently the Yankee columns began to break and men to
fall out to the rear. The retreating numbers gradually in-
crease, and the great mass, without line or form, now move
back like a great multitude without guide or leader. From a
slow, steady walk, the great mass, or many parts of it, move
at a run. Jackson's men, yelling like devils, now charge upon
the scattered crowd ; but it is easily seen that they themselves
had severely sufi'ered, and were but a handful compared with
the overwhelming forces of the enemy. The flags of two or
three regiments do not appear to be more than fifty yards
apart. The brilliant aff'air has not occupied more than half
an hour, but in that brief time more than a thousand Yankees
have been launched into eternity, or left mangled on the ground.

Tlie whole scene of battle now changes. It will be seen in
referring to the disposition of our forces, that Jackson's line,
which formed our left, stretched from Bull Run towards a point
on the Warrenton turnpike. In his severe action with the en-
emy, his left, advancing more rapidly than his right, had swept
around by the Pittsylvania House, and was pressing the Fed-
erals back towards the turnpike. It was now the golden op-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. Ill

portnnity for Longstreet to attack the exposed left flank of the
enemy in front of it.

Hood's brigade charged next the turnpike. In its track it
met Sickles' Excelsior brigade, and almost annihilated it.
The ground was piled with the slain. Pickett's brigade was
on the right of Hood's, next came Jenkins' brigade, and next
was Kemper's, which charged near the Conrad House. Evans'
and Anderson's were the reserve, and subsequently came into
action.

Not many minutes elapsed after the order to attack passed
along our entire line before the volleys of platoons, and finally
the rolling reports of long lines of musketry, indicated that
the battle was in full progress. The whole army was now in
motion. The woods were full of troops, and the order for the
supports to forward at a quick step was received with enthusi-
astic cheers by the elated men. The din was almost deafen-
ing, the heavy notes of the artillery, at first deliberate, but
gradually increasing in their rapidity, mingled with the sharp
treble of the small-arms, gave one an idea of some diabolical
concert in which all the furies of hell were at work. Through
the woods, over gently rolling hills, now and then through an
open field we travel on towards the front. From an elevation
we obtain a view of a considerable portion of the field. Hood
and Kemper are now hard at it, and as they press forward,
never yielding an inch, sometimes at a double quick, you hear
those unmistakable yells, which tell of a Southern charge or a
Southern success.

Keaching the vicinity of the Chinn House, the eye at once
embraces the entire vista of battle — at least that portion of it
which is going on in front of Longstreet. Some of our men
are in the woods in the rear, and some in the open field where
stretches the undulating surface far away towards Bull Run.
The old battle-ground is plainly discernible less than two miles
distant, and to the right and left, as well as in front, the coun-
try is comparatively unobstructed by heavy woods. Just be-
fore you, only three or four hundred yards away, are the in-
fantry of the enemy, and at various points in the rear are their
reserves and batteries. Between the armies, the ground is
already covered with the dead and wounded, for a distance
lengthwise of nearly a mile.

112 THE SECOND YKAE OF THE WAR.

Our own artillery are likewise upon commanding positions,
and you hear the heavy rush of shot, the terrible dumps into
the ground, and the crash of trees through which they tear with
resistless force on every side.

Nothing can withstand the impetuosity of our troops. Every
line of the enemy has been broken and dispersed, but rallies
again upon some other position behind. Hood has already
advanced his dit^ision nearly half a mile at a double-quick, the
Texans, Georgians, and Hampton Legion loading and firing as
they run, yelling all the while like madmen. They have cap-
tured one or two batteries and various stands of colors, and are
still pushing the enemy before them. Evans, at the head of
his brigade, is following on the right, as their support, and.
pouring in his effective volleys. Jenkins has come in on the
right of the Chinn House, and, like an avalanclie, sweeps
down upon tlie legions before him with resistless force. Still
further to the right is Longstreet's old brigade, composed of
Yirginians — veterans oi every battle-field — all of whom are
fighting like furies. The First Yirginia, which opened the
fight at Bull Run on the 17th of July, 1861, with over six
hundred men, now reduced to less than eighty members, is
winning new laurels ; but out of the little handful, more than
a third have already bit the dust. , Toombs and Anderson,
with the Georgians, together with Kemper and Jenkins, are
swooping around on the right, flanking the Federals, and driv-
ing them towards their centre and rear. Eschelman, witli his
company of the Washington artillery ; Major Garnett, with
his battalion of Yirginia batteries, and others of our big guns,
are likewise working around upon the enemy's left, and p(3ur-
ing an enfilading fire into both their infantry and artillery.

While the grand chorus of battle is thundering along our
front, Jackson has closed in upon the enemy on their right, and
Longstreet has similarly circumscribed them on their left. In
other words, the Y shaped lines with which we commenced the
engagement have opened at the angle, while the two opposite
ends of the figure are coming together. Lee has advanced his
battalion of artillery from the centre, and from hill-top to hill-
top, wherever he can eftect a lodgment, lets loose the racing
masses of iron that chase each other through the Federal
ranks. Pryor, Featherstone, and Wilcox being on the ex-

THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAR. 113

trerne left of Ljngstreet's line, are co-operating with the army
of Jackson.

It was at this point of the battle, when our infantry, pouring
dQwn from the right and left, made one of the most terrible
and sublime bayonet charges in the records of war. There was
seen emerging from the dust a long, solid mass of men, coming
down upon the worn and disheartened Federals, at a bayonet
charge, on the double-quick. This line of bayonets, in the dis-
tance, presented a spectacle at once awful, sublime, terrible, and
overwhelming. " They came on," said a Northern account, re-
ferring to the Confederates, " like demons emerging from the
earth." With grim and terrible energy, our men came up
within good range of the enemy's columns ; they take his fire
without a halt ; a momentary confusion ensues as the leaden
showers are poured into our ranks; but the next moment the
bugles sound the order to our phalanxes, and instantly the huge
mass of Confederates is hurled against the enemy's left wing.
The divisions of Reno and Schenck — the choicest veterans of
the Federal army are swept away. Setting up a yell of tri-
umph, our men push over the piles of their own dead and the
corpses of many a Federal, using the bayonet at close quarters
with the enemy.

The rout of the enemy was complete. It had been a task
of almost superhuman labor to drive the enemy from his
strong points, defended as they w'ere by the best artillery and
infantry in the Federal army, but in less than four hours from
the commencement of the battle our indomitable energy had
accomplished every thing. The arrival of R. H. Anderson
with his reserves soon after the engagement was fairly opened,
proved a timely acquisition, and the handsome manner in which
he brought his troops into position showed the cool and skilful
general. Our generals, Lee, Longstreet, Jackson, Hood, Kem-
per, Evans, Jones, Jenkins, and others, all shared the dangers
to which they exposed their men. How w^ell their colonels
and the subordinate ofhcers performed their duty is best testi-
fied by the list of killed and wounded.

In determining the fortunes of the battle our cavalry had in
more than one instance played a conspicuous part.

As the columns of the enemy began to give way. Gen. Bev-
erly Robinson was ordered by Gen. Longstreet to charge the

114 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

flying masses with liis brigade of cavalry. The brigade rmm
bering a thousand men, composed of Munford's, Myers', Har-
man's, and Flourney's regiments, was immediately pnt in mo-
tion, but before reaching the infantry. Gen. Robinson discovered
a brigade of the enemy, fifteen hundred strong, drawn up on
the crest of a hill directly in his front. Leaving one of his
regiments in reserve, he charged with the other three full at
the enemy's ranks. As our men drew near, the whole of the
Yankee line fired at them a volley from their carbines, most of
the bullets, however, whistling harmlessly over their heads.
In another instant the enemy received the terrific shock of our
squadrons. There was a pause, a hand-to-hand fight for a
moment, and the enemy broke and fled in total rout. All
organization was destroyed, and every man trusted for his
safety only in the heels of his horse.

Night closed upon the battle. When it was impossible to
use fire-arms the heavens were lit up by the still continued
flashes of the artillery, and the meteor flight of shells scatter-
ing their iron spray. By this time the enemy had been forced
across Bull Run, and their dead covered every acre from the
starting-point of the fight to the Stone bridge. In its first
stages, the retreat of the enemy was a wild, frenzied rout ; the
great mass of the enemy moving at a full run, scattering over
the fields and trampling upon the dead and living in the mad
agony of their flight. The whole army was converted into a
mob ; regiments and companies were no longer distinguisha-
ble ; and the panic-stricken fugitives were slaughtered at every
step of their retreat — our cavalry cutting them down, or our
infa!itry driving their bayonets into their backs.

In crossing Bull Run many of the enemy were drowned,
being literally dragged and crushed under the water, which was
not more than waist deep, by the cro«;v^ds of frenzied men press-
ing and trampling upon each other in the stream. On reach-
ing Centreville the flight of the enemy was arrested by the
appearance of about thirty thousand fresh Yankee troops —
Gen. Franklin's corps. The mass of fugitives was here rallied
into the extent of forming it again into columns, and with this
appearance of organization, it was resolved by Gen. Pope to
continue his retreat to the intrenchments of Washington.

Thus ended the second great battle of Manassas. We had

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 115

driven the enemy up hill and down, a distance of two and a
half miles, strewing this great space with his dead, captured
thirty pieces of artillery, and some six or eight thousand stand
of arms. Seven thousand prisoners were paroled on the field
of battle. For want of transportation valuable stores had to
be destroyed as captured, while the enemy at their various
depots are reported to have burned many millions of property
in their retreat.

The appearance of the field of battle attested in the most
terrible and hideous manner the carnage in the ranks of the
enemy. Over the gullies, ravines, and valleys, which divided
the opposite hills, the dead and wounded lay by thousands, as
far as the eye could reach. The woods were full of them. In
front of the Chinn House, which had been converted into a
hospital, tho havoc was terrible. The ground was strewn not
only with men, but arms, ammunition, provisions, haversacks,
canteens, and whatever else the affi'ighted Federals could
throw away to facilitate their flight. In front of the positions
occupied by Jackson's men, the killed were more plentiful. In
many instances as many as eighty or ninety dead marked the
place where had fought a single Yankee regiment. Around
tlie Henry and Robinson Houses the dead were more scattered,
as if they were picked off, or killed while running. The body
of a dead Yankee was found lying at full length upon the
grave of the aged Mrs. Henry, who was killed by the enemy's
balls in the old battle that had raged upon this spot. Three
others were upon the very spot where Bartow fell, and within
a few feet of the death-place of Gen. Bee was still another
group. A little farther on a wounded Federal had lain for the
last two days and nights, where by extending his hand on either
side he could touch the dead bodies of his companions. His
head was pillowed on one of these. Confederate soldiers were
also to be found in the midst of these putrefying masses of
death ; but these were comparatively rare. The scenes of the
battle-field were rendei'ed ghastly by an extraordinary circum-
stance. There was not a dead Yankee in all that broad field
who had not been stripped of his shoes or stockings — and in
numerous cases been left as naked as the hour he was born.
Our barefooted and ragged men had not hesitated to supply their
necessities even from the garments and e:3^uipments of the dead.

116 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK.

The euemj admitted a loss down-to Friday, night of 17,000
men, Pope officially stating his loss on that day to have been
8,000. In one of the Baltimore papers it was said that the
entire Yankee loss, including that of Saturday, was 32,000
men — killed, wounded, and prisoners. This statement allows
15,000 for the loss on Saturday. That the loss of that par-
ticular day was vastly greater than the enemy aamit, we take
to be certain. They are not the persons to over-estimate their
own losses, and, in the mean time, Gen. Lee tells us that over
7,000 of them were taken and paroled on the field. If they
fought the battle with any thing like the desperation they pre-
tend, considering that it lasted five hours, they certainly had
more than 8,000 killed and wounded. Four days after the
battle there were still three thousand wounded Yankees un-
cared for within the lines of Gen. Lee. It is very certain, if
they were not cared for, it was because the number of wounded
was so great that their turn had not come. Our own wounded,
not exceeding, it is said, 3,000, could very well be attended to
in a day, and then the turn of the Yankees would come. Yet
so numerous were they, that at the end of four days three
thousand of them had not received surgical assistance. This
indicates an enormous list of wounded, and confirms the report
of one officer, who puts down their killed at 5,000, and their
wounded at three times that figure, making 20,000 killed and
wounded, and of others who say that their killed and wounded
were to us in the proportion of five, six, and even seven to one.
As many prisoners were taken, who were not included in the
7,000 paroled men mentioned by Gen. Lee, we do not think we
make an over-estimate when we set down the whole Yankee loss
at 30,000 in round numbers. Their loss on Friday, estimated
by Pope himself at 8,000, added to their loss on Saturday,
makes 38,000. Previous operations, including the battle of
Cedar Run, the several expeditions of Stuart, and the various
skirmishes in which we were almost uniformly victorious, we
should think would fairly bring the total loss of the enemy to
50,000 men, since our forces first crossed the Rapidan. This
is a result almost unequalled in the history of modem cam-
paigns.

The results of -Gen. Lee's strategy were indicative of the
resources of military genius. Day after day the enemy were

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 117

beaten, until his disasters culminated on the plains of Ma-
nassas. Day after day our officers and men manifested their
superiority to the enemy. The summer campaign in Yirginia
had been conducted by a single army. The same toil-worn
troops who had relieved from siege the city of Richmond, had
advanced to meet another invading army, reinforced not only
by the defeated army of McClellan, but by the fresh corps of
Generals Burnside and Hunter. The trials and marches of
these troops are extraordinary^ in history. Transportation was
inadequate ; the streams which they had to cross were swollen
to unusual height ; it was only by forced marches and repeated
combats they could turn the position of the enemy, and, at
last succeeding in this, and forming a junction of their columns,
in the face of greatly superior forces, they fought the decisive
battle of the 30tli of August, the crowning triumph of their
toil and valor.

The route of the extraordinary marches of our troops pre-
sented, for long and weary miles, the touching pictures of the
trials of war. Broken-down soldiers (not all " stragglers")
lined the road. At night-time they might be found asleep in
every conceivable attitude of discomfort — on fence rails and in
fence corners — some half bent, others almost erect, in ditches
and on steep hill-sides, some without blanket or overcoat. Day-
break found them drenched with dew, but strong in purpose ;
with half rations of bread and meat, ragged and barefooted,
they go cheerfully forward. No nobler spectacle was ever pre-
sented in history. These beardless youths and gray -haired
men, who thus spent their nights like the beasts of the field,
were the best men of the land — of all classes, trades, and pro-
fessions. The spectacle was such as to inspire the prayer that
ascended from the sanctuaries of the South — that God miacht
reward the devotion of thes^men to principle and justice by
crowning their labors and sacrifices with that blessing which
always bringeth peace.

The victory which had crowned the campaign of our armies
in Virginia, illuminates the names of all associated with it.
But in the achievement of that victory, and in the history of
that campaign, there is one name which, in a few months, had
mounted to the zenith of fame ; which in*dramatic associations,
in rapid incidents, and in swift and sudden renown, challenged

118 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR.

comparison with the most extraordinary phenomena in the
annals of military genius. This remark is not invidious in its
spirit, nor is it forced into the context of this sketch. A per-
sonal allusion may be spared in the narrative, when that allu-
sion is to the most remarkable man in the history of the war.

"We refer to Gen. Stonewall Jackson and that M'onderful
chapter of military achievements which commenced in the Yal-
}ey of Virginia and concluded at Manassas. It was difBcult to
say what this man had not accomplished that had ever before
been accomplished in history with equal means and in an equal
period of time.

In the spring, Gen. Jackson had been placed in command of
the small army of observation which held the upper valley of
the Shenandoah and the country about Staunton. It was. in<-
tended that he should remain quasi inactive, to watch the
enemy and to wait for him ; but he soon commenced manceuv-
ring on his own responsibility, and ventured upon a scale of
operations that threw the higher military authorities at Kicli-
mond into a fever of anxiety and alarm.

In less than thirty days he dashed at the Yankee advance,
and driving it back, wheeled his army, swept down the Valley,
and drove Banks across the Potomac. Returning to the upper
Valley, he manoeuvred around for three weeks — in the mean
time dealing Fremont a heavy blow at Cross Keys and defeat-
ing Shields in the Luray valley — and then suddenly swept
down the Vii^ginia Central railroad, via Gordonsville, on
McClellan's right, before Richmond. The part he played in
winding up the campaign on the Peninsula is well known.
Almost before the smoke had lifted from the bloody field of
the Chickahominy, we hear of him again on his old stamping
ground above Gordonsville. Cedar Mountain was fougSI and
won from Pope before he knew his campaign was opened.
Jackson fell back, but only to flank him on the right. Pope
retired from the Rapidan to the Rappahannock, but Jackson
swung still further round to the North, and outflanked him
again. Yet again he gave up the Rappahannock and fell back
south of Warrenton, and, for the third time, Jackson outflanked
him through Thoroughfare Gap, and at last got in his rear.
Pope now had to fight ; and the victory which perched upon
our banners was the most brilliant of the war.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 119

It is curious to observe with wliat insolent confidence the
Korth had anticipated a crowning triumph of its arms on the
field of Manassas, even when the air around "Washington was
burdened with the signals of its defeat. The North did not
tolerate the idea of defeat. On the very day of the battle,
"Washington was gay with exultation and triumph over an im-
agined victory. At thirty minutes past twelve o'clock, the
Washington Star published a dispatch, declaring that it had.
learned from parties just from Fairfax county, that the firing
had stopped ; and added, " we trust the fact means a surrender
of the rebels, and do not see how it can mean aught else." At
a later hour of the afternoon, a dispatch was received at the
"War Department, from Major-gen. Pope, announcing a bril-
liant victory in a decisive battle with the Confederate forces
on the old Bull Run battle-field. It was stated that he had
defeated the Confederate army, and was driving it in discom-
fiture before him. This dispatch had a magical effect. Tlie
War Department, contrary to its usual custom, not only per-
mitted, but officially authorized the publication of the dispatch.
Citizens of every grade, of both sexes and of all ages, were
seen in groups around the corners, and in the places of public
resort, speculating upon the particulars and the consequences
of the decisive victory reported. The triumph of the Federal
arms was apparently shoM-n to be more complete by reason of
the announcement that Gen. Stonewall Jackson, with sixteen
thousand of his troops, had been cut off and captured.

It was at this point of exultation that another dispatch was
received from Gen. Pope, stating that the uncertain tide of
battle had unfortunately turned against the Federal army, and
that he had been compelled to abandon the battle-field during
the evening. The revulsion was great; the untimely hallelu-
jahs were interrupted, and the population of Washington, from
its hasty and indecent exultations of the morning, was soon to
be converted into a panic-stricken community, trembling for
its own safety.

Indeed, the victory achieved by the Confederates was far
more serious than the most lively alarm in Washington could
at first imagine. The next morning after the battle, the last
feeble resistance of the Federals at Centreville was broken.
The finishing stroke was given by the Confederates under Gen.

120 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAB.

A. P. Hill, who, on the first of September (Monday), encoun-
tered a large body of the enemy at Germantown, a gmall vil-
lage in Fairfax count}^, near the main road leading from Cen-
treville to Fairfax Court-house. The enemy, it appears, had
succeeded in rallying a sufficient number of their routed troops
at the point named, to make another show of opposition to
the advance of the victorious Confederates on their territory.
On Sunday, the pursuit of Pope's army was commenced and
pressed with vigor on the Fairfax Court-house road, and on
Monday morning at daylight the enemy was discovered drawn
up in line of battle across tile road, their right extending to
the village of Germantown. Gen. Hill immediately ordered
the attack, and after a brief but hotly contested fight, the
enemy withdrew. During the night, the enemy fell back to
Fairfax Court-house and abandoned his position at Centreville.
The next day, about noon, he evacuated Fairfax Court-house,
takins: the road to Alexandria and Washington.

Thus were realized the full and glorious results of the second
victory of Manassas; thus were completed the great objects of
the brilliant summer campaign of 1863 in Virginia ; and thus,
for a second time, on the famous borders of the Potomac, the
gates were thrown wide open to the invasion 5f the Korth, and to
new fields of enterprise for the victorious armies of the South.

The rapid change in the fortunes of the Confederacy, and
the sharp contrast between its late forlorn situation and what
were now the brilliant promises of the future, were animating
and suggestive topics.

Little more than three months had elapsed since the columns
of a hostile army were debouching on the plains near Pich-
mond, when the evacuation of the city and a further retreat of
the Confederate army were believed by nearly all official per-
sons the most prudent and politic steps that the government
could take under the circumstances. Little more than three
months had elapsed since our armies were retreating weak and
disorganized before the overwhelming force of the enemy,
yielding to them the sea-coast, the mines, the manufacturing
power, the grain fields, and even entire States of the Confed-
eracy. Now we were advancing with increased numbers, im-
proved organization, renewed courage, and the prestige of
victory, upon an enemy defeated and disheartened.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAR. 121

As the opposing armies of the war now stood, the South
had causes for congratulation and pride such, perhaps, as no
other people ever had in similar circumstances. The North
had a population of twenty-three millions against eight mil-
lions serving the South, and of these eight millions nearly
three millions were African slaves. The white population of
!N^ew York and Pennsylvania was greater than that of the
Confederate States. Manufacturing establishments of all de-
scriptions rendered the North a self-sustaining people for all»
the requirements of peace or war, and, with these advantages,
they retained tho^e of an unrestricted commerce with foreign
nations. The North had all the ports of the world open to its
ships ; it had furnaces, foundries, and workshops ; its manufac-
turing resources, compared with those of the South, were as
five hundred to one ; the great marts of Europe were open to
it for supplies of arms and stores ; there was nothing of mate-
rial resource, nothing of the apparatus of conquest that was
not within its reach.

The South, on the other hand, with only a few insignificant
manufactories of arms and materials of war, textile fabrics,
leather, &c., had been cut off" by an encircling blockade for
fifteen months from all those supplies upon which she had de-
pended from the North and from Europe, in the way of arms,
munitions of war, clothing, medicines, and many of the essen-
tials of subsistence. The South was without the vestige of a
navy, except a straggling ship or two, while that of the North
in this war was equal to a land force of three or four hundred
thousand men. The South was nearly exhausted of the com-
monest articles of food, while the Northern States had a super-
abundance of all the essentials and luxuries of life. The
Northern troops, en masse, were better armed, equipped, and
subsisted than those of any other nation, while those of the
South were armed with all sorts of weapons — good, bad, and
indifferent — clothed in rags and fed upon half rations.

The result of all this immense and boasted superiority on
the part of the North, coupled with the most immense exer-
tions, was that the South remained unconquered. The result
was humiliating enough to the warlike reputation of the North.
It had not been separated fi'om its feeble adversary by seas or
mountains, but only by a geographical line ; nature had not

122 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

interfered to protect tlie weak from the strong. Three " grand
armies" had advanced against Richmond ; and yet not only
was the South more invincible in spirit than ever, but her ar-
mies of brave and ragged men were already advancing upon
the ISTorthern borders, and threatening, at least so far as to
alarm their enemy, the invasion of Ohio and Pennsylvania, and
the occupation of the Northern capital.

THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAK. 123

CHAPTER lY.

Eescue of Virginia from the Invader. — Gen, Loring's Campaign in the Kanawha
Valley. — A Novel Theatre of the War. — Gen. Lee's Passage of the Potomac. — Ilis
Plans. — Disposition of onr Forces. — McClellan again at the Head of the Yankee
Army. — The Battle of Boonsboro'. — The Capture of Harper's Ferry. — Its Fruits.
■ — The Batfle of Sharpsburg. — Great Superiority of the Enemy's Numbers. — Fury
of tlie Battle. — The Bridge of Antietam. — A Drawn Battle. — Spectacles of Carnage. —
The Unburied Dead. — Gen. Lee retires into Virginia. — McClellaii's Pretence of
Victory. — The Affair of Shepherdstown. — Charges against McClellan. — His Disgrace.
— Review of the Maryland Campaign. — Misrepresentations of Gen. Lee's Objects. —
His Ketreat. — Comment of the New York " Tribune." — The Cold Eeceptiqa of the
Confederates in Maryland. — E.xcuses for the Timidity of the Marylanders. — What
■was accomplished by the Summer Campaign of 1862. — The Outburst of Applause in
Europe. — Tribute from the London " Times." — Public Opinion in England. — Di.s-
tinction between the People and the Government. — The Mask of England. — Our For-
eign Eelations in the War. — An Historical Parallel of Secession. — Two Remarks on
the "Neutrality" of Europe. — The Yankee Blockade and the Treaty of Paris. — The
Confederate Privateers. — Temper of the South. — Fruits of the Blockade.

The close of the sninmer found the long-harassed soil of
Yirgiuia cleared of the footsteps of the invader. The glorious
victory of Manassas was followed by other propitious events in
this State of lesser importance, but which went to complete
the general result of her freedom from the thraldom of the
Yankee.

In the early part of September the campaign of Gen. Loring
in the valley of the Kanawha was consummated by a vigorous
attack on the enemy at Fayette Court-house, and the occupa-
tion of Charlestown by our troops. On the 10th of that month
w^e advanced upon the enemy's front at Fayette Court-house,
while a portion of our forces made a detour over the mountain
so as to attack liim in the rear. The fighting continued from
noon until night, our artillery attacking desperately in front ;
and the enemy took advantage of the darkness to effect his es-
cape, not, however, without leaving his trains in our hands.

The Yankees made a stand at Cotton Hill, seven miles fui-
ther on. A few hours' fighting dislodged them, and \ve pur-
sued on to Kanawha Falls, where they again made a stand ;
but a few hours' contest made us again masters of the field,
with more than a million dollars' worth of stores and some
prisoners.

124 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

The advance of our troops to Charlestown was tlie signal to
the enemy for an inhuman attempt to burn the town, the
women being di'iven from their homes on fifteen minutes' no-
tice. As our troops approached the town, dense clouds of black
smoke were seen to hang over it, mingled with the lurid glare
of burning buildings, while the shrieks of frightened women
and children filled the air. The sight stung to madness our
troops. Two regiments of Kanawha valley men, beholding
in plain view the homes of their childhood blazing, and catch-
ing the cries of distress of their mothei's, wives, and sisters,
rushed, furious and headlong, to the rescue. Happily they
were not too late to arrest the conflagration, and a few public
buildings and some private residences were all that fell under
the enemy's torch.

The campaign of the Kanawha was accomplished by us with
a loss of not more than a hundred men. The results were ap-
parently of great importance, as we had secured the great
salines of Yirginia,* driven the enemy from the valley of the
Kanawha, and put our forces in position to threaten his towns
on the bank of the Ohio. But unhappily we shall have occa-
sion hereafter to see that these results were ephemeral, and
that this unfortunate part of Virginia was destined to other
experiences of the rigor of the enemy.

For the present the progress of events takes us from the old
battle-fields of the South and introduces us to a novel theatre
of the war — that theatre being located for the first time on the
soil and within the recognized dominions of the enemy.

On the fourth day of September, Gen. Lee, leaving to his
right Arlington Heights, to which had retreated the shattered
army of Pope, crossed the Potomac into Maryland.

Tlie immediate designs of this movement of the Confederate

* But few persons, even in the South, have adequate ideas of the resources
and facilities for the production of salt in the Kanawha valley, and of the value
of that small strip of Confederate territory. In Kanawha county alone forty fur-
naces were in operation ; some operated by gas and some by coal. Salt by the
million of bushels had been sold here from year to year at twelve cents and
twenty cents per bushel, filling the markets of the West and South. Ships for
Liverpool had formerly taken out salt as ballast ; and yet, at one time in the
war, owing: to the practical cutting off of the saline supplies in Viiginia, this
article, formerly of such cheap bulk, had been sold in Richmond at a dollar and
a half a pound.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WA"R. 12-5

commander were to seize Harper's Ferrj and to test the spirit
of the Marylanders ; bnt in order to be unmolested in his plans,
he threatened Pennsylvania from Hagerstown, throwing Gov.
Curtin almost into hysterics, and animating Baltimore with
the hope that he would emancipate her from the iron tyranny
of Gen. "Wool.

After tlie advance of onr army to Frederick, the Northern
journals were tilled with anxious reports of a movement of our
troops in the direction of Pennsylvania. While the people of
the ISTorth were agitated by these reports, the important move-
ment undertaken for the present by Gen. Lee was in the direc-
tion of Virginia. It appears that for this purpose our forces
in Maryland were divided into three corps, commanded by
Generals Jackson, Longstreet, and Hill. The forces under
Jackson having recrossed the Potomac at Williamsport and
taken possession of Martinsburg, had then passed rapidly be-
hind Harper's Ferry, that a capture might be eifected of the
garrison and stores known to be there. In the mean time, the
corps of Longstreet and Hill were put in position to cover the
operations of Jackson, and to hold back McClellan's forces,
which were advancing to the relief of Harper's Ferry.

Gen. McClellan had resumed the chief command of the
Federal armies on the second day of September. On the
fourteenth of that month, he fought his first battle in Mary-
land, called the battle of Boonesboro', or of South Mountain.

THE BATTLE OF BOONESBORo',

When Jackson had diverged to the left from the line of
march pursued by the main body of the Confederates, recross-
ing the Potomac and moving rapidly npon Harper's Ferry,
Gen. Longstreet had. meanwhile continued his march to Ha-
gerstown, and there awaited the result. To frustrate this de-
sign, and relieve Gen. Miles and the ten or twelve thousand
men who occupied Harper's Ferrj^ the enemy moved their
entire force upon the Gap in the mountains, to which we have
alluded, and there sought to break through the barrier we were
Bo jealously guarding, divide our lines, and defeat our armies
in detail. Foreseeing this intention on the part of the Fed-
erals, Gen. Lee had posted the division of Gen. D. II. Hill in

126 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE "WAE.

and around the Gap, on the opposite side and summit, with in«
structions to hold the position at every hazard, until he was
notified of the success of the movement of Jackson and his
co-operates. It was certainly no part of the original plan to
fight a pitched battle here, except to secure this one desirable
result.

The pass is known as Boonesboro' Gap, being a continuation
over the broad back of the mountain of the national turnpike.
The road is winding, narrow, rocky, and ragged, with either a
deep ravine on one side and the steep sides of the mountain on
the other, or like a huge channel cut through a solid rock.
!Near the crest are two or three houses, which, to some extent,
overlook the adjacent valleys, but elsewhere the face of the
mountain is unbroken by a solitary vestige of the handiwork
of man.

The battle commenced soon after daylight, by a vigorous
cannonade, under cover of which, two or tliree hours later, first
the skirmishers and then the main bodies became engaged. A
regular line of battle on our part, either as regards numbers
or regularity, was impossible, and the theatre of the fight was
therefore limited. The fortunes of the day, which were des-
perate enough in the face of the most overwhelming numbers,
were stubbornly contested by the Confederates. The brigade
of Gen. Garland of V^irginia, the first engaged, lost its brave
commander. While endeavoring to rally his men, he fell,
pierced in the breast by a musket ball, and died upon the field.

While our lines were giving way under the pressure of the
enemy's numbers, the welcome sounds of reinforcements were
borne on the air. The corps of Gen. Longstreet was at Ha-
gerstown, fourteen miles distant, and at daylight commenced
its march towards the scene of action. Hurrying forward
with all speed, stopping neither to rest nor eat, the advance
arrived at the pass about four o'clock, and were at once sent
into the mountain. Brigade after brigade, as rapidly as it
came up, followed, until by five o'clock nearly the entire com-
mand, with the exception of the brigade of Gen. Toombs,
which had been left at Hagerstown, was in position, and a poi-
tion of it already engaged. Evans was assigned to the extreme
left, Drayton to the right, and Hood, with his " ragged Tex-
ans," occupied the centre.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAR. 127

The accession of fresh numbers at once changed the tone
and temper of the combat. The ominous volleys of musketry
rolled down the mountain in almost deafening succession.
But advance we could not. The enemy in numbers were like
a solid wall. Their bayonets gleamed from behind every rock
and bush. Retreat we would not, and thus we fought, dog-
gedly giving and taking the fearful blows of battle, until long
after nightfall.

The cessation of firing left the respective forces, with some
exceptions, in nearly the same relative situation as at the com-
mencement of the battle. The enemy gained nothing and we
lost nothing. On the contrary, our object had been obtained.
We had encountered a force of the enemy near fivefold our
own, a^d after a bloody day, in which our killed and wounded
were quite twenty-five hundred and those of the enemy prob-
ably more, we had held him in check until Gen. Jackson was
heard from and the success of his enterprise rendered certain.

THE CAPTURE OF HAEPEr's FEERT.

While the action of Boonesboro' was in progress, and the
enemy attempting to force his way through the main pass on
the Frederick and Hagerstown road, the capture of Harper's
Ferry was accomplished by the army corps of Gen. Jackson.

During the night of the 14th of September, Gen. Jackson
planted his guns, and in the morning opened in all directions
on the Federal forces drawn up in line of battle on Bolivar
Heights. The white flag was raised at twenty minutes past
seven. At the moment of surrender. Col. Miles, the Federal
commander, was struck by a piece of shell, which carried away
his left thigh. " My God, I am hit," he exclaimed, and fell
into the arms of his aid-de-camp.

The extent of the conquest is determined by the fact that we .
took eleven thousand troops, an equal number of small-arms,
seventy-three pieces of artillery, and about two hundred wagons.
The force of the enemy which surrendered consisted of twelve
regiments of infantry, three companies of cavalry, and six com-
panies of artillery. The scene of the surrender was one of
deep humiliation to the ISTorth. It was indeed a repetition of
the revolutionary glories of Yorktown, to see here the proud,

128 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

gajly-dressed soldiers of the oppressor drawn np in line, stack-
ing tlieir arms, and snrrendering to the ragged, barefoot, half-
starved soldiers of liberty.*

* Official Eepokt op Operations of Gen. Jackson's Command, from
September 5tli to September 27tli, 1862.

Headquarters 'Hd Corps A. JST. V., )
April 23d, 1863. f

General, — I have the bonor to submit a report of the operations of my com-
mand from the 5th to the 27th of September, 1862, embracing the capture of
Harper's Ferry, the engagement at Shepherdstown, and so much of the battle
of Sharpsburg as was fought by my command.

My command comprised A. P. Hill's division, consisting of the brigades of
Branch, Gregg, Field (Col. Brockenbrough commanding), Pender, Archer, and
Col. Thomas, with the batteries of the division, under Lieut.-col. R. L. Walker ;
Ewell's division, under Brigadier-gen. Lawton, consisting of the bdg-ades of
Early, Hays (Col. Strong), Trimble (Col. Walker), and Lawton (Col. T)ouglas),
with the artillery under Major Courtney ; and Jackson's division, under Briga
dier-gen. Starke, consisting of the brigades of Winder (Col. Grigsby), Jones (Col.
B. T. Johnson), Taliaferro (Col. Warren), and Starke (Col. Stafford), with the
artillery under Major Shumaker, Chief of Artillery.

On the 5th of September my command crossed the Potomac at White's ford,
and bivouacked that night near the Three Springs, in the State of Maryland.
Not having any cavalry with me except the Black liurse, imder Capt. Randolph,
I directed him, after crossing the Potomac, to take a part of his company and
scout to the right, in order to prevent a surprise of the column from that direc-
tion. For the thorough and efficient manner in which this duty was performed,
and for the valuable service rendered generally whilst attached to my head-
quarters, I desire to make special mention of this company and of its officers,
Capt. Randolph, and Lieuts Paint, Tyle, and Smith, who frequently transmit-
ted orders, in the absence of staff-officers.

The next day we arrived in the vicinity of Frederick City. Jackson's division
encamped near its suburbs, except the brigade of Gen. Jones (Col. Bradley T.
Johnson commanding), which was posted in the city as a provost guard. Ewell's
and Hill's divisions occupied positions near the railroad bridge, on the Mono-
cacy, guarding the approaches from Washington city. In obedience to instruc-
tions from the commanding general, and for the purpose of capturing the Fed-
eral forces and stores then at IMartinsburg and Harper's Ferry, my command
left the vicinity of Frederick City on the 10th, and passing rapidly through
Middletown, Boonesborough, and Williamsport, recrossed the Potomac into Vir
ginia, at Light's ford, on the 11th. Gen. Hill moved with his division on the
turnpike direct from Williamsport to Martinsburg. The divisions of Jackson
and Ewell proceeded towards the North Mountain depot, on the Baltimore and
Ohio railroad, about seven miles northwest of Martinsburg. They bivouacked
that night in the vicinity of the depot. In order to prevent the Federal forces
then at Martinsburg from escaping westward unobserved, !Major Myers, com-
manding the cavalry, sent part of his troops as far south as the Berkeley and
Hampshire turnpikes. Brigadier-gen. White, who was in command of the
Federal forces at Martinsburg, becoming advised of our approach, evacuated

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 129

THE BATTLE OF SHARPSBITRG.

1

On tlie ITth of September Gen. Lee had retired to unite his
forces, as far as possible, to confront the still advancing forces

the place on tlie night of the 11th, and retreated to Harper's Ferry. On the
morning of the 12th, our cavalry entered the town, as in the course of the day
did the main body of my command. At this point, abandoned quartermaster,
commissary, and ordnance stores fell into our hands. Proceeding thence to-
wards Harper's Ferry, about 11 o'clock, A. M., on the following morning (13th),
the head of the column came in view of the enemy drawn up in force at Boli-
var Heights. Gen. Hill, who was in the advance, went into camp near Halls-
town, about two miles from the enemy's position. The two other divisions
encamped near by.

The commanding general, having directed Major-gen. McLaws to move with
his own and Gen. K. H. Anderson's division, to take possession of the Mary-
land Heights, overlooking Harper's Ferry, and Brigadier-gen. J. G. Walker,
pursuing a diiferent route, to cross the Potomac, and move up that river on the
Virginia side, and occupy the Loudon Heights, botli for the purpose of co-oper-
ating with me, it became necessary, before making the attack, to ascertain
whether they were in position. Failing to learn the fact by signals, a courier
was dispatched to each of these points ibr the required information. During
the night the courier from the Loudon Heights returned, with a message from
Gen. Walker, that he was in position. In the mean time, Gen. McLaws had
attacked the Federal force posted to defend the Maryland Heights, had routed
it, and taken possession of that commanding position. The Potomac river
flowed between the positions respectively occupied by Gen. McLaws and my-
self, and the Shenandoah separated me from Gen. Walker ; and it became ad-
visable, as the speediest mode of communication, to resort to signals. Before
the necessary orders were thus transmitted, the day was far advanced. The
enemy had, by fortifications, strengthened the naturally strong position which
he occupied along Bolivar Heights, extending from near the Shenandoah to the
Potomac. McLaws and Walker, being thus separated from the enemy by in-
tervening rivers, could afford no assistance, beyond the fire of their artillery,
and guarding certain avenues of escape to the enemy. And from the reports
received from them by signals, in consequence of the distance and range of
their guns, not much could be expected from their artUlery, so long as the
enemy retained Ms advanced position on Bolivar Heights.

In the afternoon (14th), Gen. HiU was ordered to move along the left bank
of the Shenandoah, turn the enemy's left, and enter Harper's Ferry. Gen.
Lawton, commanding Ewells division, was directed to move along the turnpike
for the purpose of supporting Gen. Hill, and of otherwise operating against the
enemy to his left.

Gen. J. R. Jones, commanding Jackson's division, was directed, with one of
his brigades, and a battery of artillery, to make a demonstration against the
enemy's right, whilst the remaining part of his cotnmand, as a reserve, moved
along the turnpike. Major Massie, commanding the cavalry, was directed to
keep upon our left flank, for the purpose of preventing the enemy from escaping.
Brig.-gen. Walker guarded against an escape across the Shenandoah river.

9

130

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

of McClellan, wliicli, having obtained possession of Crampton's
Gap, on the direct road from Frederick City to Sharpsburg,
were pressing our forces, and seemed determined on a decisive

Fearing lest the enemy should attempt to escape across the Potomac, by means
of signals I called the attention of Major-gen. McLaws, commanding on the Ma-
ryland Heights, to the propriety of guarding against such an attempt. The
demonstration on the left against the enemy's right was made by Winder's bri-
gade (Col. Grigsby commanding). It was ordered to secure a commanding hill
to the left of the heights, near the Potomac. Promptly dispersing some cav-
alry, this eminence, from which the batteries of Poague and Carpenter subse-
quently did such admirable execution, was secured without difficulty. In exe-
cution of the orders given Maj.-gen. Hill, he moved obliquely to the right untU
he struck the Shenandoah river. Observing an eminence, crowning the ex-
treme left of the enemy's line, occupied by infantry, but without artillery, and
protected only by an abatis of fallen timber, Pender, Archer, and Brocken-
brough were directed to gain the crest of that hill, while Branch and Gregg
were directed to march along the rive^ and during the night to take advantage
of the ravines, cutting tlie precipitous banks of the river, and establish them-
selves on the plain to the left and rear of the enemy's works. Tliomas followed
as a reserve. The execution of the first movement was intrusted to Brig.-gen.
Pender, who accomplished it with slight resistance ; and during the night,
Jjieut.-coL Walker, chief of artillery of Hill's division, brought up the batteries
of Captains Pegram, Mcintosh, Davidson, Braxton, and Crenshaw, and estab-
lished them upon the position thus gained. Branch and Gregg also gained the
positions gained for them, and daybreak found them in rear of the enemy's line
of defence.

As directed, Brig.-gen. Lawton, commanding Ewell's division, moved on the
turnpike in three columns — one on the road, and another on each side of it —
until he reached Hallstown, where he formed line of battle, and advanced to
the woods on School-house Hill. The division laid on their arms during the
night, Lawton and Trimble being in line on the right of the road, and Hays on
his left, with Early immediately in his rear. During the night, Col. Crutch-
field, my chief of artillery, crossed ten guns of Ewell's division over the Shen-
andoah, and established them on its right bank, so as to enfilade the enemy's
position on Bolivar Heights, and take his nearest and most formidable fortifica-
tions in reverse. The other batteries of Ewell's division were placed in position
on School-house Hill and Bolivar Heights, on each side of the road.

At dawn, Sept. 15th, Gen. Lawton advanced his division to the fi-ont of th©
woods, Lawton's brigade (Col. Douglas commanding) moved by flank to the
bottom between School-house Hill and Bolivar Heights, to support the advance
of Maj .-gen. HUl.

Lieut.-col. Walker opened a rapid enfilade fire from all his batteries at about
one thousand yards' range. The batteries on School-house Hill attacked the
enemy's line in front. In a short time the guns of Capts. Brown, Garber, Lati-
mer, and Dement, under the direction of Col. Crutchfield, opened from the rear.
The batteries of Poague and Carpenter opened fire upon the enemy's right.
The artillery upon the Loudon Heights of Brig.-gen. Walker's command, under
Capt. French, which had silenced the enemy's ai*tillery near the auperia-

THK SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 131

battle. Sharpsburg is about ten miles north of Harper's Ferry,
and about eiffht miles west of Boonesboro'.

This town lies in a deep valley. The country around it is
broken. Ascending a hill just on the outer edge of the town,

tendent's house, on the preceding afternoon, again opened upon Harper's Ferry,
and also some guns of Maj.-gen. McLaws, from the Maryland Heights. In an
hour the enemy's fire seemed to be silenced, and the batteries of Gen. Hill wer«
ordered to cease their fire, which was the signal for storming the works. Gen.
Pender had commenced his advance, when, the enemy again opening, Pegram
and Crenshaw moved forward their batteries and poured a rai)id fire into the
enemy. The white Hag was now displayed, and shortly afterwards, Brig.-gen.
White (the commanding oflScer, Col. D. S. Miles having been mortally wounded),
with a garrison of about 11,000 men, surrendered as prisoners of war.

Under this capitulation we took possession of 73 pieces of artillerj^ some
13,000 small-arms, and other stores. Liberal terms were granted Gen. White
and the officers under his command in the surrender, which I regret to say,
do not seem, from subsequent events, to have been properly appreciated by
their government.

Leaving Gen. Hill to receive the surrender of the Federal troops, and taking
the requisite steps for securing the captured stores, I moved, in obedience to
orders from the commanding general, to rejoin him in Maryland with the re-
maining divisions of my command. By a severe night's march, we reached the
vicinity of Sharpsburg on the morning of the 16th.

By direction of the commanding general I advanced on the enemy, leaving
Sharpsburg to the right, and took position to the left of Gen. Longstreet, near
a Dunkard church, Ewell's division (Gen. Lawton commanding), forming the
right, and Jackson's division (Gen. J. R. Jones, commanding), forming the left
of my command. Major-gen. Stuart, with the cavalry, was on my left.

Jackson's division (Gen. Jones commanding), was formed partly in an open
field and partly in the woods, with its right resting upon Sharpsburg and
Hageretown turnpike, Winder's and Jones' brigades being in front, and Talia^
ferro's and Starke's brigades a short distance in their rear, and Poague's battery
on a knoll in front.

Ewell's division followed that of Jackson to the wood on the left of the road
near the church. Early's brigade was thus formed on the left of the line of
Jackson's division to guard its flank, and Hays' brigade was formed in its rear •
Lawton's and Trimble's brigades remaining during the evenmg with arms
stacked near the church.

A battery of the enemy, some five hundred yards to the front of Jackson's
division, opening fire upon a battery to the right, was silenced in twenty
minutes by a rapid and well-directed fire from Poague's battery ; other batteries
of the enemy opened soon after upon our lines and the firing continued until
after dark.

About 10 P. M., Lawton's and Trimble's brigades advanced to the front to
relieve the command of Brigadier-general Hood (on the left of Major-general
D. H. Hill), which had been more or less engaged during the evening. Trim-
ble's brigade was'posted on the right, next to Ripley's, of D. H. Hill's division,
and Lawton's on the left.

132 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAK.

and looking towards the Blue Ridge, the eye ranges over the
greater portion of the eventful field. To the riglit and left is
a succession of hills, which were occupied by the Confederates.
In front is the beautiful valley of the x\ntietam, divided longitu-

The troops slept that night upon their arms, disturbed by the occasional fire
of the pickets of the two armies, Avho were in close proximity to each other. At
the first dawn of day, skirmishing commenced in front, and in a short time the
Federal batteries, so posted on the opposite side of the Antietam as to enfilade
my line, opened a severe and damaging fire. This was vigorously replied to
by the batteries of Poague, Carpenter, Brockenbrough, Raine, Caskie, and
"Wooding. About sunrise the Federal infantry advanced in heavy force to the
edge of the wood on the eastern side of the turnpike, driving in our skirmishers.
Batteries were opened in front from the wood with shell and canister, and our
troops became exposed, for near an hour, to a terrific storm of shell, canister,
and musketry. Gen. Jones having been compelled to leave the field, the com-
mand of Jackson's division devolved upon Gen. Starke. With heroic spirit our
lines advanced to the conflict and maintained their position in the face of supe-
rior numbers. With stubborn resolution, sometimes driving the enemy before
them and sometimes compelled to fall back, before their well-sustained and
destructive fire. Fresh troops from time to time relieved the enemy's ranks,
and the carnage on both sides was terrific. At this early hour Gen. Starke
•was killed. Col. Douglas (commanding Lawton's brigade) was also killed ; Gen.
Lawton, commanding division, and Col. Walker, commanding brigade, were
severely wounded. More than half of the brigades of Lawton and Hays were
either killed or wounded, and more than a third of Trimble's, and all the regi-
mental commanders in those brigades except two were killed or wounded.
Thinned in their ranks and exhausted of their ammunition, Jackson's division
and the brigades of Lawton, Hays, and Trimble retired to the rear, and Hood,
of Longstreet's command, again took the position from which he had been be-
fore relieved.

In the mean time. Gen. Stuart moved his artillery to a position nearer to the
main command and more in our rear. Early being now directed, in conse-
quence of the disability of Gen. Lawton, to take command of Ewell's division,
returned with his brigade (with thq exception of the 13th Virginia regiment,
which remained with Gen. Stuart), to the piece of wood where he had left the
other brigades of his division when he was separated from them. Here he
found that the enemy had advanced his infantry near the wood in which was
the Dunkard church, and planted a battery across the turnpike near the edge
of the wood and an open field, and that the brigades of Lawton, Hays, and
Trimble had fallen back some distance to the rear. Finding here Cols. Grigsby
and Stafford with a portion of Jackson's division, which formed on his left, he
determined to maintain his position there if reinforcements could be sent to his
support, of which he was promptly assured. Col. Grigsby, with his small com-
mand, kept in check the advance of the enemy on the left flank while Gen.
Early attacked with great vigor and gallantry the column on his right and
front. The force in front was giving way under this attack, when another
heavy column of Federal troops were seen moving across the plateau on his
left flank. By this time the expected reinforcements, consisting of Semmes

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR. 133

dinally by the river, which empties into the Potomac on your
right, and behind, forraiiig a background to the picture; only
two miles distant are the steep, umbrageous sides of the Blue
Ridge,

and Anderson's brigades, and a part of Barksdale's of McLaw's division, arrived,
and the whole, including Grisby's command, now united, charged upon the
enemy, checking his advance, then driving him back with great slaughter en-
tirely from and beyond the wood, and gaining possession of our original position.
No further advance, beyond demonstrations, was made by the enemy on the
left. In the afternoon, in obedience to instructions from the commanding gen-
eral, I moved to the left with a view of tiirning the Federal right, but I found
his numerous artillery so judiciously established in their front and extending
BO near to the Potomac, which here makes a remarkable bend, which will be seen
by reference to the map herewith annexed, as to render it inexpedient to hazard
the attempt. In this movement Major-gen. Stuart had the advance and acted
his part well. This officer rendered valuable service throughout the day. His
bold use of artillery secured for us an important position, which, had the enemy
possessed, might have commanded our left. At the close'of the day my troops
held the ground which they had occupied in the morning. The next day we
remained in position awaiting another attack. The enemy continued in heavy
force west of the Antietam on our left, but made no further movement to the
attack.

I refer you to the report of Major-gen. A. P. Hill for the operations of his com-
mand in the battle of Sharpsburg. Arriving upon the battle-field from Har-
per's Ferry at half-past two o'clock of the 17tli, he reported to the commanding
general, and was by him directed to take position on the right. I have not
embraced the movements of his division, nor his kiUed and wounded of that
action in my report.

Early on the morning of the 19th we recrossed the Pttomac river into Vir-
ginia, near Shepherdstown. The promptitude and succ >ss with which thia
movement was effected reflected the highest credit upon the skUl and energy
of Major Harman, chief quartermaster. In the evening the command moved on
the road leading to Martinsburg, except Lawton's brigade (Col. Lamar, of the
61st Georgia, commanding), which was left on the Potomac Heights.

On the same day the enemy approached in considerable force on the northern
side of the Potomac, and commenced planting heavy batteries on its heights.
In the evening the Federals commenced crossing under the protection of their
guns, driving off Lawton's brigade, and Gen. Pendleton's artillery. By morn-
ing a considerable force had crossed over. Orders were dispatched to Gens.
Early and Hill, who had advanced some four miles on the Martinsburg road, to
return and drive back the enemy.

Gen. Hill, who was in the advance, as he approached tlie town, formed his
line of battle in two lines, the first composed of the brigades of Pender, Gregg,
and Thomas, under the command of Gen. Gregg ; and the second of Lane's,
Archer's, and Brockenbrough's brigades, under command of Gen. Arch«r.
Gen. Early, with the brigades of Early, Trimble, and Hays, took position in the
wood on the right and left of the road leading to the ford. The Federal infan-
try lined the high banks of the Virginia shore, while their artillery, formidable

134: THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

The morning of tli^lYth found Gen. Lee strongly posted,
but with no more than fortj-five thousand men when tlie bat-
tle commenced. The force of the enemy could not have been
much short of one hundred and fifty thousand men, of whom
one hundred thousand were trained soldiers, disciplined in camp
and field since the commencement of the war.

The forces of the enemy were commanded by McClellan in
person, and numbered the whole command of Gen. Burnside,
recently augmented by the addition of several new regiments;
the army corps lately under Gen. McDowell, now under com-
mand of Gen. Hooker; Gen. Sumner's corps; Gen. Franklin's
corps; Gen. Banks' corps, commanded by Gen. Williams; and
Sykes' division of Fitz John Porter's corps. Their line of
battle was between four and five miles long, with their left
stretching across the Sharpsburg road. Burnside was on the
extreme left ; Porter held a commanding eminence to the right

in numbers and weiglit of metal, crowned the opposite heights of the Potomac.
Gen. Hill's division advanced with great gallantry against the infantry, in the
face of a continued discharge of shot and shell from their batteries. The Fed-
erals massing in front of Pender, poured a heavy fire into his ranks, and th(,n
extending with a view to turn his left. Archer promptly formed on Pender "a
left, when a simultaneous charge was made, which drove the enemy into the
river, followed by an appalling scene of the destruction of human life. Two
hundred prisoners were taken. This position on the banks of the river we con-
tinued to hold that day, although exposed to the enemy's guns and mthin
range of his sharpshooters posted near the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. Our
infantry remained at the river until relieved by cavalry under Gen. Fitzhugh Lee.

On the evening of the 20th the command moved from Shepherdstown and
encamped near the Opequon, in the vicinity of Martinsburg. We remained near
Martinsburg until the 27th, when we moved to Bunker Hill, in the county of
Berkeley. The official lists of the casualties of my command during the period
embraced in this report, will show that we sustained a Iciss of 38 officers killed,
171 woimded ; of 313 non-commissioned officers and privates killed, 1,859 wound-
ed ; and missing 57— making a total loss of 2,438, killed, wounded, and missing.

For these great and signal victories our sincere and humble thanks are due
mito Almighty God. Upon all appropriate occasions we should acknowledge
the hand of Him who reigns in heaven and rules among the powers of the earth.
In view of the arduous labors and great privations which the troops were called
on to endure, and the isolated and perilous position which the command occu-
pied while engaged with the greatly superior force of the enemy, we feel the
encouraging consolation that God was with us and gave to us the victory, and
unto His holy name be all gratitude and praise.

I am, general, very respectfully.

Your obedient servant,

T. J. Jackson, Lieutenant-general.

THE SKCOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 135

of Biirnslde, thongli Warren's brigade of Porter's corps was
subsequently posted in the woods on the left in support oi
Burnside's men ; Sumner's corps was on an eminence next to
the right, or north from Porter, and Gen. Hooker had the
extreme right.

On the afternoon of Tuesday, the 16th, the enemy opened
a light artillery fire on our lines. At three next morning
every man was at his post, and awaited in solemn silence the
day dawn. 'No sooner did the light break in the east than the
picket firing began, and increased in fury until about sunrise,
when artillery and infantry together grappled in the terrible
fight.

Large masses of the Federals, who had crossed the Antietam
above our position, assembled on our left. They advanced in
three compact lines. The divisions of Generals McLaws, R. H.
Anderson, A. P. Hill and AValker, who were expected to have
joined Gen. Lee on the previous night, had not come up. Gen-
erals Jackson's and Ewell's divisions were thrown to the left of
Generals Hill and Longstreet. The enemy advanced between
the Antietam and the Sharpsburg and HagerstoMm turnpike,
and was met by Gen. D. H. Hill's and the left of Gen, Long-
street's divisions, where the conflict raged, extending to our
entire left.

When the troops of D. H. Hill were engaged, the battle
raged with uncommon fur}'. Backwards, forwards, surging
and. swaying like a ship in storm, the various columns are seen
in motion. It is a hot place for the enemy. They are directly
under our guns, and we mow them down like grass. The raw
levies, sustained by the veterans behind, come up to the work
well, and fight for a short time with an excitement incident to
their novel experiences of a battle ; but soon a portion of their
line gives way in confusion. Their reserves come up, and.
endeavor to retrieve the fortunes of the day. Our centre, how-
ever, stands firm as adamant, and they fall back.

Prior to the arrival of the divisions of McLaws, Anderson
and Walker, who had been advanced to support the left wing
and centre, as soon as they had crossed the Potomac on the
morning of the 17th, that portion of our line was forced back
by superior numbers. As soon, however, as these forces could
be brought into action, the enemy was driven back, our line

136 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE "WAR.

was restored, and our position maintained during the rest of
the day.

Time and again did the Federals perse veringly press close
up to our ranks — so near, indeed, that their supporting bat-
teries were obliged to cease firing, lest they should kill their own
men, but just as often were they driven back, by the combined
elements of destruction which we brought to bear upon them.
It was an hour when every man was wanted. And nobly did
our brave soldiers do their duty. "It is beyond all wonder,"
writes a Federal officer, " how men such as the rebel troops
are can fight as they do. That those ragged wretches, sick,
hungry, and in all ways miserable, should prove such heroes
in fight, is past explanation. Men never fought better. There
was one regiment that stood up before the fire of two or three
of our long-range batteries and of two regiments of infantry ;
and though the air around them was vocal with the whistle of
bullets and the scream of shells, there they stood and delivered
their fire in perfect order."*

In the afternoon the enemy advanced on our right, where
Gen. Jones' division was posted, and he handsomely main-
tained his position. The bridge over the Antietam creek was
guarded by Gen. Toombs' brigade, which gallantly resisted the
approach of the enemy ; but their superior numbers enabling
them to extend their left, they crossed below the bridge, and
forced our line back in some confusion.

Our troops fought until they were nearly cut to pieces, and
then retreated only because they had fired tlieir last round.
It was at this juncture that the immense Yankee force crossed
the river, and made the dash against our line, which well-nigh

* There are some characteristic anecdotes of the close quarters in which the
■battle of Sharpsburg was fought, and the desperate valor shown in such straits.
At one passage of the battle, Col. Geary, of the famous Hampton Legion, one
of the most celebrated corps of the army, found himself confronted by an over-
whelming force of the enemy. An officer came forward and demanded his sur-
render. " Surrender ! Hell !" exclaimed the intrepid South Carolinian, as with
the spring of a tiger he seized the officer and clapped a pistol to his head, *" il
you don't surrender your own command to me this instant, you infernal scoun-
drel, rU blow your brains out." The astonished and affrighted Yankee called
out that he surrendered. But his men were not as cowardly as himself, and
the flag of the regiment he commanded was only taken after the color-beaier
had been cut down by our swords.

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR. 187

■proved a siTCcess. But it was at tins moment also that wel-
come and long-expected reinforcements reached ns. At four
o'clock in the afternoon Gen. A. P. Hill's division came up and
joined the Confederiite right. It was well that Gen. Burnside's
advance on the Federal left was so long delayed, and was
eventually made with overwhelming numbers. The day closed
with Gen. Burnside clinging closely to the bridge, beyond
which he could not advance, with Gen. Jackson on the same
ground as the Confederates held in the morning, upon as level
and drawn a battle as history exhibits. But it was fought for
half the day with 45,000 men on the Confederate side, and for
the remaining half with no more than an aggregate of 70,000
men, against a host which is admitted to have consisted of
130,000, and may have been more.

It is certain that if we had had fresh troops to hurl against
Burnside at the bridge of Antietam, tlie day would have been
ours. The anxious messages of this officer to McClellan for
reinforcements were again and again repeated as the evening
wore on, and the replies of that commander showed that he
understood where was the critical point of the battle. As the
sun was sinking in the west, he dispatched orders to Gen.
Burnside, urging him to hold his position, and as the messen-
ger was riding away he called him back — " Tell him if he
cannot hold his ground, then the bridge, to the last man ! —
always the bridge ! If the bridge is lost, all is lost."

The enemy held the bridge, but of other portions of the
field we retained possession. Varying as may have been the
successes of the day, they left us equal masters of the field
with our antagonist. But our loss had been considerable ; it
was variously estimated from five to nine thousand ; and we
had to deplore the fall of Gens. Branch and Starke, with
other brave and valuable officers. The loss of the enemy was
not less than our own.* They had fought well and been ably

_ .

* The New York Tribune said : " The dead lie in heaps, and the wounded
are coming in by thousands. Around and in a large barn about half a mile
from the spot whare Gen. Hooker engaged the enemy's left, there were counteJ
1,250 wounded. In Sumner's corps alone, our loss in killed, wounded and
missing amounts to five thousand two hundred and eight. The 15th Massa-
chusetts regiment went into the battle with five hundred and fifty men, and
same out with one hundred and fifty-six. The 19th Massachusetts, of four

138 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR.

commanded. But thej had the advantage not only of num-
bers, but of a position from which they could assume an offen-
sive or defensive attitude at will, besides which their signal
stations on the Blue Ridge commanded a view of our every
movement.

The battle-fiel.d of Sharpsburg will long be remembered from
the terrible and hideous circumstances that so many of the
dead were left unburied upon it. Some of them laid with their
faces to the ground, whither they had turned in the agony of
death, and in which position they had died ; others were heap-
ed in piles of three and four together, with their arms inter-
locked, and their faces turned upwards towards the sky. Scores
of them were laid out in rows, as though the death-shot had
penetrated their breasts as they were advancing to the attack.
Covered with mud and dust, with their faces and clothes smear-
ed with blood and gore, there they rotted in the sun !

The close of this great battle left neither army in a condition
to renew the conflict, although our own brave troops were des-
perately ready to do so. But the next morning McClellan had
disappeared from our front, and, knowing the superiority of
the enemy's numbers, and not willing to risk the combinations
he was attempting. Gen. Lee crossed the Potomac without mo-
lestation, and took position at or near Shepherdstown.

The enemy claimed a victory, but the best evidence, if any
were wanting, to prove that he was really defeated and his
army crippled, is found in the fact that he did not renew the
fight on the succeeding day, and on the next permitted Gen.
Lee to recross the Potomac without an attempt to obstruct
him. The pretence of victory on this occasion cost McClellan
his command. On the 20th of September he made a feint or
a weak and hesitating attempt to cross the Potomac at Shep-
herdstown, when the column which had crossed was fallen
upon by A. P. Hill and pushed into the river, which was filled
with the dead and wounded attempting to escape.

The charges against McClellan consequent upon his pre-

hundred and six, lost all but one hundred and forty-seven. The 5th New
Hampshire, about three hundred strong, lost one hundred and ten enlisted
men and fourteen officers. Massachusetts, out of eight regiments engaged,
loses upwards of fifteen hundred, and Pennsylvania has suffered more than
any other State."

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 139

tended victory, were sustained by the official testimony of tlia
Yankee commander-in-cliief. The report of Gen. Hallcck ac-
cused McClellan of disobedience of orders, in refusing to ad-
vance against the enemy after the battle of Sharpsburg, upon
the plea that the army lacked shoes, tents, stores, and other
necessaries, which Gen. Halleck held to be entirely unfounded,
asserting that all the wants of the army were duly cared for,
and that any causes of delay tliat might have occurred were
trivial and speedily remedied. He furthermore charged
McClellan with willful neglect of a peremptory order of the
6th of October to cross the Potomac immediately, to give battle \
to the Confederates or to drive them south. -^

A fatal consequence to the Yankees of the campaign in
Maryland was the sacrifice to popular clamor and othcial envy
of him whom they had formerly made their military pet and
"Napoleon," and who, although the extent of his pretensions
was ridiculous, was really esteemed in the South as the ablest
general in the North. The man who succeeded him in the com-
mand of the army of the Potomac was Gen. Ambrose Burn-
Bide, of Ehode Island. He had served during the Mexican
war as a secon^ lieutenant ; and at the time he was raised to
his important command, the captain of the company with
which he had served in Mexico, Edmund Barry, was a recruit-
ing agent in Richmond for the " Maryland Line."

We have perhaps imperfectly sketched the movements of
the Maryland campaign.* But we have sought to determine

* It would be difficult to find a more just summary of the campaign in North-
ern Virginia and on the Upper Potomac, or one the statements of which may
be more safely appropriated by history than the following address of Gen. Lee
to his army :

Headquakters Akmy Northern Virginia,)
October 2d, 1862. )

General Orders, iVb. 116.

In re\'iewing the achievements of the army during the present campaign, the
commanding general cannot withhold the expression of his admiration of the
indomitable courage it has displayed in battle, and its cheerful endurance of
privation and hardship on the march.

Since your great victories around Richmond you have defeated the enemy at
Cedar Mountain, expelled him from the Eappahaunock, and, aftf.r a conflict of
three days, utterly repulsed him on the Plains of Manassas, and forced him to
take shelter within the fortifications around his capital.

Without halting for repose you crossed the Potomac, stormed the heights of

140 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK.

its historical features without any large enumeration of details.
It was mixed with much of triumph to us ; it added lustre to
our arms ; it inflicted no loss upon us for which we did not ex-
act full retribution ; it left the enemy nothing but barren re-
sults ; and it gave us a valuable lesson of the state of public
opinion in Maryland.

There is one point to which the mind naturally refers for a
just historical interpretation of the Maryland campaign. The
busy attempts of newspapers to pervert the truth of history
were renewed in an effort to misrepresent the designs of Gen.
Lee in crossing the Potomac, as limited to a mere incursion,
the object of which was to take Harper's Ferry, and that ac-
complished, to return into Virginia and await the movements
of McClellan. It is not possible that our commanding gene-
ral can be a party to this pitiful deceit, to cover up any failure
of his, or that he has viewed with any thing but disgust the
offer of falsehood and misrepresentation made to him by flat-
terers.

Harper's Ferry, made prisoners of more than eleven tliousand men, and captured
upwards of seventy pieces of artillery, all their small arms and other munitions
of war.

While one corps of the army was thus engaged, the other insured its success
by arresting at Boonesboro' the combined armies of the enemy, advancing under
their favorite general to the relief of their beleaguered comrades.

On the field of Sharpsburg, with less than one-tliird his numbers, you resisted,
from daylight until dark, the whole army of the enemy, and repulsed every at-
tack along his entire front, of more than four miles in extent.

The whole of the following day you stood prepared to resume the conflict on
the same ground, and retired next morning, without molestation, across the
Potomac.

Two attempts, subsequently made by the enemy to follow you across the
river, have resulted in his complete discomfiture, and being driven back with
loss.

Achievements such as these demanded much valor and patriotism. His-
tory records few examples of greater fortitude and endurance than this army
has exhibited ; and I am commissioned by the President to thank you, in the
name of the Confederate States, for the undying fame you have won for their
arms.

Much as you have done, much more remains to be accomplished. The
enemy again threatens us with invasion, and to your tried valor and patriot-
ism the country looks with confidence for deliverance and safety. Your past
exploits give assurance that this confidence is not misplaced.

R. E. Lee,
General Commanding.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 141

Let it be freely confessed, that the object of Gen. Lee in
crossing the Potomac was to hold and occupy Maryland ; that
his proclamation issued at Frederick, offering protection to the
Marylanders, is incontrovertible evidence of this fact ; that he
was forced to return to Yirglnia, not by stress of any single
battle, but by the force of many circumstances, some of which
history should blush to record ; that, in these respects, the
Maryland campaign was a failure. But it was a failure re-
lieved by brilliant episodes, mixed with at least one extra-
ordinary triumph of our arras, and to a great extent comj)en-
Bated by many solid results.

In the brief campaign in Maryland, our army had given the
most brilliant illustrations of valor ; it had given the enemy at
Harper's Ferry a reverse without parallel in the history of the
war ; it had inflicted upon him a loss in men and material
greater than our own ; and in retreating into Yirginia, it left
him neither spoils nor prisoners, as evidence of the successes
he claimed. The indignant comment of the New York Trilmne
on Lee's retirement into Yirginia is the enemy's own record of
the barren results that were left them. " He leaves ns," said
this paper, " the debris of his late camps, two disabled pieces
of artillery, a few hundred of his stragglers, perhaps two thou-
sand of his wounded, and as many more of his unburied dead.
Not a sound field-piece, caisson, ambulance, or wagon, not a
tent, a box of stores, or a pound of ammunition. He takes
with him the supplies gathered in Maryland, and the rich spoils
of Harper's Ferry." The same paper declared, that the failure
of Maryland to rise, or to contribute recruits (all the acces-
sions to our force, obtained in this State, did not exceed eight
hundred men), was the defeat of Lee, and about the only defeat
he did sustain ; that the Confederate losses proceeded mainly
from the failure of their own exaggerated expectations ; that
Lee's retreat over the Potomac was a masterpiece ; and that
the manner in which he combined Hill and Jackson for tlie en-
velopment of Harper's Ferry, while he checked the Federal
columns at Hagerstown Heights and Crampton Gap, was prob-
ably the best achievement of the war.

The failure of the people of Maryland to respond to the
proclamation of Gen, Lee issued at Frederick, inviting them
to his standard, and generously assuring protection to all classes

142 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

of political opinion, admits of some excuse ; but the expla-
nations commonly made on this subject do not amount to their
vindication. It is true that when Gen. Lee was in Frederick,
he was forty-five miles from the city of Baltimore — a city
surrounded V)y Federal bayonets, zealously guarded by an armed
Federal police, and lying in the shadow of Fort Mcllenry
and of two powerful fortifications located within the limits of
the corporation. It is true that oiir army passed only through
two of the remote counties of the State, namely Frederick
and "Washington, which, with Carroll and Alleghany, are well
known to contain the most violent " Union " population in
Maryland. It is true that the South could not have expected
a welcome in these counties or a desperate mutiny for the
Confederacy in Baltimore. But it was expected that Southern
sympathizers in other parts of the State, who so glibly ran the
blockade on adventures of trade, might as readily work their
way to the Confederate army as to the Confederate markets;
and it was not expected that the few recruits who timidly ad-
vanced to our lines would have been so easily dismayed by the
rags of our soldiers and by the prospects of a service that prom-
ised equal measures of hardship and glory.

The army which rested again in Virginia had made a history
that will flash down the tide of time a lustre of glory. It had
done an amount of marching and fighting that appears almost
incredible, even to those minds familiar with the records of
great military exertions. Leaving the banks of James river,
it proceeded directly to the line of the Rappahannock, and
moving out from that river, it fought its way to the Potomac,
crossed that stream, and moved on to Fredericktown and Ha-
gerstown, had a heavy engagement at the mountain gaps be-
low, fought the greatest pitched battle of the war at Sliarps-
burg, and then recrossed the Potomac back into Yirginia.
During all this time, covering the full space of a month, the
troops rested but four days. Of the men who performed these
wonders, one-fifth of them were barefoot, one-half of them in
rags, and the whole of them half famished.

The remarkable campaign which we have briefly sketched,
extending from the banks of the James river to those of the
Potomac, impressed the world with wonder and admiration,
excited an outburst of applause among living nations, which

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 143

anticipated the verdict of posterity, and set the whole of
Europe ringing with praises o^ the heroism and fighting quali-
ties of tlie Southern armies. Tlie Soutli was ah-eady obtain-
ing some portion of the moral rewards of this war, in the esti-
mation in whicli she was held by the great martial nations of
the world. She had purchased the rank with a bloody price.
She had extorted homage from the most intelligent and influ-
ential organs of public opinion in the Old World, from men
well versed in the history of ancient and modern times, and
from those great critics of contemporary history, Avhich are
least accustomed to the language of extravagant compliment.

The following tribute from the London Times — the great
organ of historic pi'ecedent and educated opinion in the Old
World — was echoed by the other journals of Europe:

" The people of the Confederate States have made themselves
famous. If the renown of brilliant courage, stern devotion to
a cause, and military achievements almost without a parallel,
can compensate men for the toil and privations of the hour,
then the countrymen of Lee and Jackson may be consoled
amid their sufferings. From all parts of Europe, from their
enemies as well as their friends, from those who condemn their
acts as well as those who sympathize v/ith them, comes the
tribute of admiration. When the history of this war is written,
the admiration will doubtless become deeper and stronger, for
the veil which has covered the South will be drawn away and
disclose a picture of patriotism, of unanimous self-sacrifice, of
wise and firm administration, which we can now only see in-
distinctly. The details of extraordinary national effort whicli
has led to the repulse and almost to the destruction of an in-
vading force of more than half a million men, will then become
known to the world, and whatever may be the fate of the new
nationality, or its subsequent claims to the respect of mankind,
it will assuredly begin its career with a reputation for genius
and valor which the most famous nations may envy."

It is at first appearance strange, that while such was the
public opinion in England of our virtues and abilities, that that
government should have continued so unjust and obstinate with
respect to our claims for recognition. But the explanation is
easy. The demonstrations of the conflict which awakened such
generous admiration of us in the breasts of a majority of the

144 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

Englisli people were to the government the subjects only of
jealous and interested views, ^e had trusted too much to
manifestations of public opinion in England ; we had lost sight
of the distinction between the people and government of that
country, and had forgotten that the latter had, since the be-
ginning af this war, been cold and reserved, had never given
us any thing to hope from its sympathies or its principles, and
had limited its action on the American question to the unfeel-
ing and exacting measures of selfishness.

The bloody and unhappy revelation which the war has made
of enormous military resources has naturally given to Europe,
and especially to England, an extraordinary interest in its con-
tinuation. It is probable that she would not have hesitated to
recognize the South, unless firmly persuaded of our ability and
resolution to carry on the war, and unless she had another ob-
ject to gain besides that of a permanent division in the nation-
ality and power of her old rival. That object was the exhaus-
tion of both North and South. England proposed to effect the
continuation of the war, as far as possible, to the mutual ruin
of the two nations engaged in it, by standing aside and trusting
that after vast expenditures of blood and waste of resources the
separation of the Union would be quite as surely accomplished
by the self-devotion of the South, as by the less profitable mode
of foreign intervention.

In this unchristian and inhuman calculation, England had
rightly estimated the resolution and spirit of the South. We
were prepared to win our independence with the great prices
of blood and suffering that she had named. But we under-
stood what lurked behind the mask of British conscience, and
we treasured the lesson for the future.

OUR FOREIGN RELATIONS IN THE WAR,

It is not amiss in this connection to make a summary in ref-
erence to the relations between the Confederacy and the neu-
tral powers of Europe during the progress of the war to the
present period of our narrative.

The confederation of the Southern States in 1861 was the
third political union that had been formed between the States
of North America. The first act of secession dates as far back

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 145

as 1789, when eleven of the States, becoming dissatisfied with
the old articles of confederation made in 1778, seceded and
formed a second union. When in 1861 eleven of the States
again seceded and united themselves under the style of the
Confederate States of North America, they exercised a right
which required no jiistilicatiun, and wliich in a former instance
had not been contested by any party at home, or made the sub-
ject of discussion with any third power.

On every attempt for the opening of formal diplomatic in-
tercourse with the European powers, the commissioners of the
Confederate States had met with the objection that these pow-
ers could not assume to judge between the conflicting repi-esen-
tations of the two parties as to the true nature of their previous
mutual relations ; and that they were constrained by interna-
tional usage and the considerations of propriety to recognize
the self-evident fact of the existence of a war, and to maintain
a strict neutrality during its progress.

On this neutrality, two remarks are to be made :

First. It was founded upon the grave error that the separate
sovereignty and independence of tlie States had been merged
into one common sovereignty ; an error easily induced by the
delegation of power granted by these States to the Federal gov-
ernment to represent them in foreign intercourse, but one that
should have been as easily dispelled by appeals to reason and
historical fact.

Secondly. The practical operation of this falsely assumed and.
falsely named " neutrality " was an actual decision against the
rights of the South, and had been but little short of active hos-
tilities against her.

By the governments of England and France, the doctrines
announced in the treaty of Paris were ignored, and the mon-
strous Yankee blockade, by some forty or fifty vessels, of a
coast line nearly three thousand miles in extent, came to be
acknowledged and respected. When this recognition of the
blockade was made, it is very certain that the whole Yankee
navy, if employed on that service and nothing else, could not
furnish vessels enough to pass signals from point to point along
the coast. At the time this paper blockade was declai-ed and
acknowledged, the Navy Eegister shows that the Federal Gov-
ernment had in commission but forty vessels, all told. These

10

146 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

were scattered over the world : some of them were in the China
seas, some in tlie Pacific, some in the Mediterranean, some in
our own part of the world, and some in another. Tlie actual
force employed in the blockading service did not give one ves-
sel for every fifty miles of coast. In addition to these con-
siderations, it had been shown by unquestionable evidence, fur-
nished in part by the officials of the European powers them-
selves, that the few Southern ports really guarded by naval
forces of the Yankees had been invested so inefficiently that
hundreds of entries had been eifected into them since the dec-
laration of the blockade.

During nearly two years of struggle had this boasted " neu-
trality" of the European powers operated as active hostility
against us, for they had helped the enemy to prevent us, with
a force which was altogether inadequate, from obtaining sup-
plies of prime necessity.

l^or was this all. We had no commerce ; but in that the
enemy was rich. We had no navy ; in that he was strong.
Therefore, when England and her allies declared that neither
the armed cruisers nor the prizes of either of the belligerents
should have hospitality and protection in neutral j^orts, the
prohibition, directed against both belligerents, was in reality
effective against the Confederate States alone, for they alone
could find a hostile commerce on the ocean.

Thus it was that, in the progress of the war, the neutral
nations of Europe had pursued a policy which, nominally im-
partial, had been practically most favorable to our enemies
and most detrimental to us.

The temper which this injustice produced in the South was
fortunate. The South was conscious of powers of resistance of
which the world was incredulous ; and the first feverish ex-
pectations of recognition by the European powers were re-
placed by a proud self-reliance and a calm confidence, which
were forming our national character, while contributing at the
same time to the immediate successes of our arms.

The recognition by France and England of Lincoln's paper
blockade, had by no means proved an unmitigated evil to us.
It had forced us into many branches of industry, into which,
but for that blockade, we should have never entered. We had
excellent powder-mills of our own, and fine armories wTiich

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAB. 147

turned out muskets, rifles, sabres, &c. The war found no
more than half a dozen furnaces in blast in the whole Confed
eracy, and most of those had been destroyed by the enemy.
But the government had given such encouragement to the iron
men that new mines had been opened in other parts of the
Confederacy, and furnaces enough were already up or in the
course of erection, to supply the wants of the government. In
the last spring we had planted not more than one-fourth of the
usual breadth of land in cotton, and our surplus labor was di-
rected to breadstuff's and provisions. All these were the fruits
to us of a blockade which threatened England especially with
a terrible reaction of her own injustice, and was laying up a
Btore of retribution for Europe.

148 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

CHAPTER Y.

Movements in the West. — The splendid Programme of the Yankees. — Kentucky
the critical Point.— Gen. Kirby Smith's Advance into Kentucky. — The Battle of
Richmond. — Reception of the Confederates in Lexington. — Expectation of an Attack
on Cincinnati. — Gen. Bragg's Plans. — Smith's Movement to Bragg's Lines. — Escape
of the Yankee Forces from Cumberland Gap. — Afl'air of Munfordsville. — Gen. Bragg
between the Enemy and the Ohio. — An Opportunity for a decisive Blow.— Buell's
Escape to Louisville. — The Inauguration of Governor at Frankfort. — An idle Cere-
mony.— Probable Surprise of Gen. Bragg. — The Battle of Perrtville. — Its Ira-
mediate Results in our Favor. — Bragg's failure to concentrate his Forces. — His Reso-
lution of Retreat. — Scenes of the Retreat from Kentucky. — Errors of the Campaign. —
A lame Excuse. — Public Sentiment in Kentucky. — The Demoralization of that
State. — The Lessons of Submission.

On the same day that victory perched on our banners on
the plains of Manassas, an important success was achieved by
our brave troops in another part of the Confederacy. A vic-
tory gained at Richmond in Kentucky gave a companion to
Manassas, and opened in the West a prospect of the advance
of our troops simultaneous with the dawn of new hopes and
aspirations in the East.

A few paragraphs are sufficient for the rapid summary of
events necessary to the contemplation of the situation in the
West, in which the battle of Richmond was won.

The North had prepared a splendid programme of opera-
tions in the country west of the Alleghanies. But few persons
on the Southern seaboard had adequate ideas of the grandeur
of the. enemy's preparations, or of the strength of the forces
concentrating on the march in the Western country. These
preparations exceeded in magnitude all military movements
designed or attempted since the commencement of the war ;
for the}'- contemplated not only the expulsion of our forces
from Kentucky and Tennessee and the States west of the Mis-
sissippi, but the penetration through the Gulf States of the
heart of the South. The army, now well on its way into Mid-
dle Tennessee, had Northern Alabama and Georgia for its
ultimate destination ; that of Grant was already advanced into
Mississippi ; that of McClernand, organizing at Columbus and

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE •VVAE. 149

Memphis, was intended to operate on the Mississippi ; another
army was already operating in Missouri and Arkansas ; and a
gunboat fleet had been placed on the waters of the Mississippi,
which was said to be terrible in destructiveness, and impreg-
nable in strength. Such was the extent of the enemy's plans
of campaign in the W^st.

The situation left the South but little choice than that of
making an aggressive movement by which North Alabama
and Middle and East Tennessee might be cleared of the forces
of the enemy, and they compelled to fall back to assist Gen,
Buell in Kentucky — this State being fixed as the critical point
in the "West, and the field of the active campaign. The brief
retirement of Gen. Beauregard from active command on ac-
count of ill health, which was made shortly after his evacua-
tion of Corinth, left the way open to the promotion of Gen.
Bragg, a favorite of the administration, who had a certain
military reputation, but, as an active commander in the field,
had the confidence neither of the army nor of the public.
The first steps of the campaign were easily decided by this
commander : it was to use the forces of Gen. Kirby Smith to
threaten Cincinnati, and thus distract the attention and divide
the forces of the enemy ; while Gen. Bragg himself, co-opera-
ting with Smith, was to fulfil the great purpose of the cam-
paign, which was the expulsion of the enemy from Kentucky
and the capture of Louisville — thus subjecting the whole ot
that great grain-growing and meat-producing commonwealth,
with all its rich stores, to our control.

Early in the month of August, Gen. McCown, under the
orders of Gen. Smith, moved his division from London to
Knoxville in East Tennessee. Thence our troops moved to
the gaps in the Cumberland mountains, being joined by Gh^ C(g(,i^y
ber-ne.'s division at the lower gap, when the whole force was
ordered through, with the trains and artillery. From this time
our troops made forced marches until they reached Barbours-
ville, which is on the main thoroughfare by which the Yankees
received their supplies at the gap by way of Lexington. Halt-
ing there long enough only to get water, our wearied army
was pushed on to the Cumberland ford. Here a few days'
rest was allowed to the troops, who had performed their hard
march over stony roads, with their almost bare feet, and with

J 50 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAR.

green corn garnished with a small supply of poor beef for
their food.

THE BATTLE OF RICHMOND.

On the 29th of August our troops were in striking distance
of the enemy at Richmond. Until our advance descended the
Big Hill, it met with no opposition from the enemy. Here,
on the morning of the 29th, the enemy was discovered to be
in force in our front, and a bold reconnoissance of the cavalry
under Colonel Scott, in the afternoon, indicated a determina-
tion to give us battle. Although Churchill's division did not
get up until quite late in the afternoon, and then in an appar-
ently exhausted state. Gen. Smith determined to march to
Eichmond the next day, even at the cost of a battle with the
whole force of the enemy. The leading division, under Gen.
Claiborne, was moved early the next morning, and, after ad-
vancing two or three miles, they found the enemy drawn up in
line of battle in a fine position, near Mount Zion church, six
miles from Richmond. Without waiting for Churchiirs divi-
sion, Claiborne at once commenced the action, and by half-
past seven o'clock in the morning, the fire of artillery was
brisk on both sides. As our force was almost too small to
storm the position in front, without a disastrous loss. Gen.
Churchill was sent with one of his brigades to turn the enemy's
right. While this movement was being executed, a bold and
well-conducted attempt on the part of the enemy, to turn
Claiborne's right, was admirably foiled by the firmness of Col.
Preston Smith's brigade, who repulsed the enemy with great
slaughter. In the mean time Gen. Churchill had been com-
pletely successful in his movement upon the enemy's right
flank, where, by a bold charge, his men completed a victory
already partially gained by the gallantry of our troops on the
left.

The Yankees having been repulsed and driven in confusion
from this part of the field, might have retreated without risk-
ing another passage at arms, had they not misapprehended our
movements.

Gen. Smith having ordered the cavalry to go around to the
north of Richmond and attempt to cut ofi* the retreat of the

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 151

enemy, our artillery ceased firing, and the enemy, thinking
our army was preparing for a retreat, had the foolhardiness to
rally on their own retreat and attempt a charge upon tliG
Texas and Arkansas troops under McCray, who, to the great
astonishment of the enemy, instead of running away, met
them on the half-way ground. This gallant brigade of Texans
and Arkansians had to fight the battle alone. Although the
odds opposed to them were fearful, yet by reserving their own
fire, under the deafening roar of the enemy's guns, and by a
well-timed and dashing charge upon the advancing lines, they
completely routed and put to flight the hosts of the enemy.
They fled in the wildest confusion and disorder. Their knap-
sacks, swords, pistols, hats, and canteens, scattered along the
road, would have marked the route they travelled, even if their
dead and dying had not too plainly showed the way.

In passing a deserted camp of the enemy. Gen. Smitli found
from some of the wounded that Gen. JSTelson, the Yankee com-
mander, with reinforcements, had arrived after the second
battle. A march of two miles brought us within sight of the
town, in front of which, and on a commanding ridge, with both
flanks resting upon woods, Nelson had determined to make a
final stand. Churchill, with a brigade, was sent ofi" to the left,
when a deafening roar of musketry soon announced the raging
of a furious combat. In the mean while, Preston Smith, bring-
ing up his division at a double-quick, formed in front of the
enemy's centre and left. Almost without waiting the com-
mand of the officers, this division coolly advanced under the
murderous fire of a force twice their number, and drove them
from the field in the greatest confusion, and with immense
slaughter. The exhausted condition of our men, together with
the closing in of night, pKevented the pursuit of the enemy
more than a mile beyond Richmond.

The results of the day were gratifying enough. "With less
than half his force. Gen. Smith had attacked and carried a very
strong position at Mount Zion church, after a hard fight of
two hours. Again, a still better position at White's farm, in
half an hour, and finall}^, in the town of Richmond, just be-
fore sunoet, our indomitable troops deliberately walked (Jthey
were too tired to run) up to a magnificent position, manned by
ten thousand of the enemy, many of them perfectly fresh, and

152 THE SECf'ND YKAR OF TlIK WAR.

carried It in fifteen minutes. In the last engagement, we tool?
prisoners frpm thirteen regiments. Onr loss in killed and
wounded was about four hundred ; that of the enemj waa
about one thousand, and his prisoners five thousand. The im-
mediate fruits of the victory were nine pieces of artillery and
ten thousand small-arms, and a large quantity of supplies.
These latter were greatly increased by the capture of Rich-
mond and Frankfort, the whole number of cannon taken being
about twenty.

On the 1st day of September Gen. Smith took up the line ol
march for Lexington ; and on the morning of the fourth day
of that month, our forces, consisting of a Texas brigade and an
Arkansas brigade, under the command of Gen. Churchill, and
Gen. Claiborne's division and Gen. Heath's division, all under
the command of Gen. Kirby Smith, marched through the city
amidst the hearty and generous welcome of thousands of men,
women, and children.

The entrance of our troops into Lexington was the occasion
of the most inspiriting and touching scenes. Streets, windows,
and gardens were filled with ladies and little girls with stream-
ers of red and blue ribbons and flags with stars. Beautiful
women seized the hard brown hands of our rough and ragged
soldiers, and with tears and smiles thanked them again and
again for coming into Kentucky and freeing them from the
presence and insults of the hated and insolent Yankees. For
hours the enthusiasm of the people was unbounded. At every
corner of the streets, baskets of provisions and buckets of water
were placed for the refreshment of our weary soldiers, and hun-
dreds of our men were presented with shoes and hats and coats
and tobacco from the grateful people. Private residences
were turned for the time into public houses of entertainment,
free to all who could be persuaded to go and eat. But if the
reception of the infantry was enthusiastic, the tears, the smiles,
and shouts and cheers of wild delight which greeted Gen.
John Morgan's cavalry as they came dashing through the
streets amidst clouds of dust, was without a parallel. The
wildest joy ruled the hours. The bells of the city pealed forth
their joyous welcome, whilst the waving of thousands of white
handkerchiefs and tiny Confederate flags attested the gladness
and delight of every heart.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE. 153

It would have been well if the enthusiasm which welcomed
Gen. Smith in this town could have been confirmed as a true
token of the public sentiment of Kentucky. But while this
sentiment was developing itself, the exultation which greeted
our troops at Lexington was reflected in other parts of the Con-
federacy ; and from the results already achieved in the West-
ern cjampaign, the Southern public was raised to the pinnacle
of hopeful expectation. When it was known at the seat of
government in Yirginia that Gen. Smith, after crushing the
force opposed to him at Richmond, had gone on and captured
Lexington, Paris, and Cynthiana, and established his lines al-
most in sight of Cincinnati, the public indulged the prospect
of the speedy capture of this great city of the West, with its
valuable stores and yards for building gunboats. What might
have been the result of a sudden attack on this city (for one
of our brigades was in striking distance of it) is left to conjec-
ture. The order was to menace, not to attack ; and the pur-
poses of the campaign projected by Gen. Bragg required that
Smith's command, after making its demonstration on the Ohio,
should fall back into the interior to co-operate with the splen-
did army he had already brought into Kentucky.

Gen. Bragg had entered the State by the eastern route from
Knoxville and Chattanooga. The direct route by the way of
Nashville would have brought him on Buell's front ; but he
chose to make the crossing of the Cumberland river several
miles above Nashville, apparently with the design of making
a flank movement on Buell. The immediate eff'ect of this
movement was to cause the Yankees to evacuate East Tennes-
see, and to relieve North Alabama from Federal occupation ;
but the enemy, learning that Cincinnati was not in immediate
danger, had abundant time to remove the forces collected for
the defence of that city, to be united with BuelFs army in
Kentucky,

The sudden disappearance of Smith from in front of Cincin-
nati, and the rapidity of his movement, intimated clearly
enough that he was making a forced march to reach Bragg
and strengthen him before a decisive trial of his strength with
Buell. But the movement deprived us of a victory that might
have been cheaply won.; for it gave opportunity of escape to
the Yankee Gen. Morgan, who had been completely hemmed

154: THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE.

in at Cumberland Gap, with an army of ten or twelve thou-
sand men and abundance of arms and equipments.

The distance to the Ohio river is about two hundred and
fifty miles, and includes the most mountainous portions of Ken-
tucky. . There are scarcely fifty miles of the entire route in*
which there are not defiles and passes where a small force
could have kept the enemy at bay. The famous cavalry com-
mander, John H. Morgan, had been sent with a portion of his
command, to harass the retreating enemy ; and this intrepid
officer, with seven hundred and fifty men, arrested the Yankee
army for five days, and might have captured them with the
half of Marshall's infantry, who were within little more than
a day's march. But reinforcements were not sent forward, and
no alternative was left to Morgan but — after inflicting such
damage as he could upon the enemy — to rejoin Smith's march,
which had now taken the direction of Frankfort.

On the 17th of September, Gen. Bragg captured about five
thousand of the enemy at Munfordsville, with the inconsider-
able loss on our side of about fifty men in killed and wounded.
He had thrown his lines between Buell's force at Bowling
Green and Louisville, and it was confidently expected that he
would engage him, drive him across the Ohio or the Missis-
sippi, or at least disconcert his hopes of preparations and
increase of forces at Louisville. Buell's entire force at this
time was not computed at over thirty-five thousand, for which
our army, in the best possible spirits and confidence, was an
overmatch.

It is probable that at this juncture the struggle in Kentucky
might have been decided by a fight on a fair field with an
army our inferior in all respects. Viewed in the light of sub-
sequent events, it is difficult to determine what good object
Gen. Bragg could have had in declining a contest with the
enemy but a few miles distant. It is still more inexplicable
that after the success of Munfordsville he should have stood
idly by and suffered Buell and his wagon trains to pass be-
tween him and the Ohio river, almost in sight of his lines.
He had passed Buell to enter Kentucky, and having accom-
plished it, his reasons for allowing his enemy to repass him and
enter Louisville are inadmissible to any justification that can
be offered by practical good sense. Whatever explanations

^ THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 155

have been made of them, it is certain that at this time the
public has not abandoned its opinion, tliat General JBragg's
failure to deliver battle at the important conjuncture which
placed him between the enemy and the Ohio, was the fatal
error of the Kentucky campaign.

On the 4th of October, Gen. Bragg joined Smith's army at
Frankfoi't, where was conducted the inauguration of the Pro-
visional Governor of Kentucky, Mr. Hawes. This ceremony,
however, was scarcely any thing more than a pretentious farce.
Scarcely was it completed, when the Yankees threatened the
State capital, and the newly installed Governor had to flee
from their approach. The delusion, that Buell's army was
quietly resting in Louisville, was dispelled by the news received
at Frankfort on 'the inauguration day, to the effect that the
Yankees were in large force within twelve miles of the place.
But the apparent movement on Frankfort was a mere feint,
while the enemy was concentrating to force our left wing near
Perryville.

THE BATTLE OF PERRYVILLE.

Having arrived at Harrodsburg from Frankfort, Gen. Bragg,
finding the enemy pressing heavily in his rear near Perryville,
determined to give him battle there, and ordered Gen. Polk to
make the attack next day. But lie had made an unfortunate
disposition of his forces, for on the day before the division of
Withers had been sent to Salvisa to reinforce Gen. Kirby
Smith and cut off Sill's division. Hardee's and Buckner's
divisions were marched to Perryville, leaving Gen. Cheatham's
at Harrodsburg, which, however, came up to Perryville on the
night of the 7th of October, before the engagement. Withers
failed to intercept Gen. Sill's division, but captured the rear-
guard, consisting of seven hundred and fifty men, with an
ammunition train ; and on the morning of the 9th, Gen. With-
ers' and Gen. Kirby Smitli's forces reached Harrodsburg, hav-
ing been too late to participate in the decisive events of the
preceding day.

The morning of the 8th of October found not more than
fifteen thousand Confederate troops confronting an enemy three
times their numbers. The forces opposed to us at Perryville

156 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAE.

consisted of the right wing of the " Armj of the Ohio," com
posed of Buell's veteran army, with Major-gen. Geo. "W. Thomaa
I as commander-in-chief of the field, and Gen. Alex. McCook
0 commanding the first corps. We fought nine divisions of the
Abolition army, composed at least of five thousand each, mak-
ing forty-five thousand men.

Gen. Buckner's division, which was posted on our extreme
right, with Anderson's division, formed the left wing of the
army of the Mississippi, under Major-gen. Hardee. Cheat-
ham's and Withers' divisions formed the right wing, under
Major-gen. Polk. Thus we had but three divisions in the
field.

The action opened a little past noon. It was only skirmish-
ing for a considerable time, Col. Powell's brigade holding the
extreme left of our lines, and gallantly driving the enemy
back for about a mile against superior foi'ces. It was about
this time, towards 4 p. m., when Gen. Smith's brigade, belong-
ing to Cheatham's division, was ordered back to our assistance,
that Gen. Adams, with his brave Louisianians, was holding the
enemy in check against fearful odds, when he was forced to fall
back from his position. Gen. Hardee, seeing the importance
of holding the point, ordered Gen. Adams to retake it, telling
him he would be supported by reinforcements. It was while
advancing again, and anxiously looking for the reinforcements,
that Gen. Adams, seeing some soldiers firing at what he sup-
posed to be our own men, ordered them to cease firing. " I
tell you, sir, they are Yankees," cried one of the officers. "I
think not, and you had better go forward first and ascertain,"
replied Adams. " I'll go, sir, but I don't think it necessary,
for I know they are Yankees," insisted the officer. " Well,"
said Adams, " I'll go myself," and dashing forward on his
charger, he had not proceeded one hundred yards when a fu-
rious storm of Minie balls whizzed by his ears from the enemy.
The general turned immediatel}'-, and riding up, shouted to
our troops to pour in their fire. Towards six o'clock the firing
became incessant on both sides. There stood Adams, with his
little brigade, holding back a division of the enemy, left, as it
were, alone to his fate, until, seeing no chance of being re-
inforced, he gradually fell back, in most excellent order, but not
without considerable loss.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 157

Towards night the engagement subsided. Fearfully out-
numbered, our troops had not hesitated to engage at any odds,
and despite the checks they had encountered at times, the
enemy was driven two miles from his first line of battle. As
darkness fell, the conflict was over. A few shots from lono-
range guns were exchanged. The full round moon rose in the
east and lighted the dismal scene. In half an hour the picket
fires of the opposing armies were visible five hundred yards
distant, and our wearied men laid down on their arms.

The immediate results of the battle of Perryville were in
our favor. We had captured fifteen pieces of artillery by the
most daring charges, had inflicted the loss of four thousand
men on the enemy, and held several hundred of his prisoners.
Our own loss was estimated at twenty-five hundred in killed,
wounded, and missing. The enemy had lost one of their best
generals on the field — Jackson. Seeing his men wavering, he
had advanced to the front line, and, waving his sword, cheered
and urged them on. While thus displaying an extraordinary
courage he was struck in the right breast by a piece of an ex-
ploded shell, and fell from his horse. It is said by those
near him that he said only, " O God !" and died without a
struggle.

But the success of Perryville was of no importance to us ;
it was merely a favorable incident and decided nothing. It is
probable Gen. Bragg had it in his power here, by concentrat-
ing his troops, to crush the enemy's force in Kentucky ; but
he allowed himself to be deceived as to the disposition of the
enemy's forces, scattered his own, and engaged and defeated
the head of the Yankee column with less than fifteen thousand
men.* Had he fallen with his whole available force, forty
thousand men, on the enemy at Perryville, it is not improba-
ble that he might have dispersed the Yankee army and given
it such a blow that it would not have made a stand this side
the Ohio river.

* It is proper to state, that an apology for Gen. Bragg, in this matter, was
offered in the public prints, to the effect that before the battle of Perryville
Gen. Kirby Smith had communicated to Gen. Bragg his positive belief that the
real attack was threatened upon him, whilst the feint was upon Perryville,
and urged reinforcements ; and that this was the reason why Gen. Withers' di-
vision was sent to Gen. Kirby Smith and was not sent to Generals Polk and
Hardee.

158 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

$

Unfortnriatelj the battle of Perryville was another experi-
ence of Shiloh, without any decisive results. Had we have
had five thousand more men, or had Withers been there, we
might have completely routed the enemy, leaving us the wa}/
clear to Louisville. No troops in the world ever fought
with more desperate courage than ours. Whole regiments of
our men went into that fight barefooted, fought barefooted,
and had marched barefooted from Chattanooga. The brunt of
the battle was borne by Gen. Cheatham's gallant Tennesseeans.
No soldiers of the Confederacy ever fought with greater
bravery.

Ascertaining that the enemy was heavily reinforced during
the night. Gen. Brac^i; withdrew his force early the next morn-
ing to Harrodsburg, where he was joined by Smith and With-
ers. On the 10th, all our forces fell back to Camp Breckin-
ridge (Dick Robinson), the cavalry holding the enemy in check
at Danville. It was supposed that Gen. Bragg would have
made a stand here, as the place was very defensible and gave
him the opportunity of sweeping the country and driving off
by private enterprise or cavalry force vast herds of cattle, so
much needed by our army. The camp is in an acute angle
formed by the junction of Kentucky and Dick's rivers, with
high and impassable and perpendicular cliffs for long distances
up these rivers, except at a few crossings ; and the upper line
of the angle has high and commanding hills, suited for ar-
tillery defences. It was said that it was impregnable to any
other attack than that of famine.

But moved by various considerations, and excited by the su-
periority of Buell's numbers, it was determined by Gen. Bragg
that the whole army should make its exodus from Kentucky ;
and in order to secure the immense quantity of captured stores,
goods, clothing, &c., much of which had also been purchased,
with some five thousand head of cattle, horses, mules, &c., that
the retreat should commence on the night of the ] 2th. On
that day, Sunday, orders were received to cook four days' ra-
tions for the march. Major-gen. McCowan, w^ith Gen. Hilliard's
Legion, and a cavalry force and artillery, was ordered to de-
fend Fishing Ford, across Dick's river, and commanding the
road to Camp Breckinridge, in our rear, to the last extremity.

The distress of those people of Kentucky who were friendly

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 159

to the South, on learning that they were to be abandoned bj
our troops, was the most affecting circumstance of the sad re-
treat. When our troops abandoned Lexington, the terror,
dismay, and anguish of the inhabitants were extreme. The
women ran through the streets crying and wringing their
hands, wliile families hastily gathered their clothing, packed
their trunks, and obtained wagons to depart, the greatest dj^-
tress prevailing.

The retreat commenced on Sunday night, the 12th October,
Major Adrain's cavalry conducting the advance train of Gen.
Kirby Smith. That night piles of goods, clothes, &c., were
burned that could not be carried off from the warehouse.
Long before day on the morning of the 13th, the whole camp
was astir. If any one doubted that we were actually retreat-
ing, the burning piles of abandoned stores, gun-carriages, &c.,
was sufficient to convince him of the deplorable fact.

At gray dawn the troops reached Bryantsville, about two
miles from the camp, where the whole command of conducting
the retreat was turned over to Gen. Polk. Already train after
train of wagons had passed, and others were still forming and
joining in the immense cavalcade. Ammunition trains and
batteries of captured artillery had preceded. Then followed
trains of goods, wares, and merchandise, provision trains of
arm.y stores, trains of captured muskets, escorts of cavalry,
artillery drawn by oxen. Then came private trains of refugee
families, flying with their negroes for safety — ladies and chil-
dren in carriages, stage-coaches, express wagons, omnibuses,
buggies, ambulances, jersey wagons, and every conceivable
vehicle imaginable, and following, came the wagons of the dif-
ferent brigades of Gen. Smith's army, with infantry, cavalry,
and artillery in the rear. Intermixed with the throng were
thousands of head of cattle, horses, and mules.

The effect of our retreat along the road everywhere was
sinking and depressing in the extreme. No miniature banners
waved, no white kerchiefs greeted our troops with approving
smiles from lovely women, and no wild cheer was heard re-
sponsive to the greetings which had attended their march into
Kentucky. Trembling women stole to the doors to look upon
the strange, mystified scene before them, and as the truth
gradually forced itself upon them, their eyes filled with tears,

160 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE.

and they shrank back, fearing even to make the slightest
demonstration of friendliness — all was sullen, downcast, and
gloomy.

The enemy was in pursuit, and making a strong effort to
flank us, so as to cut oif our trains, and it was necessary to
urge on tlie teams night and day for fear of capture. For
some portion of the way the road lay along the bed of Dick's
I'f ver, a miserable rocky branch, which our troops had to cross
and recross for six miles in a dark and hazy night. Scenes of
terrible confusion and delay occurred alons: this road. Was;-
ons broke down, were overturned, and frequently stalled, and
in the former case were often abandoned. The bawling of the
teamsters to their mules, the cracking of their whips, and vol-
leys of oaths in the most outlandish gibberish, which none but
the mules could understand, were kept up all night. In tlie
daytime more cheerful scenes relieved the retreat. The foli-
age of the forest trees and brushwood enlivened the wayside
with their rich hues of dark maroon splendor to brilliant
crimson.

The retreat was admirably covered by Gen. "Wheeler. From
the battle-field at Perryville to Cumberland Gap this general
conducted liis movements in the same masterly manner that
had characterized him in the previous part of the campaign.
He retarded the enemy by various means. "When he reached
the hilly country he obstructed the road by felled trees. By
all such ingenious devices, he, with a small force, enabled the
baggage trains and straggling infantry to escape capture.
From AUamont to Cumberland Gap he encountered the enemy
twenty-nine times, seriously damaged him, and saved much of
our infantry from capture. At Rock Castle the enemy aban-
doned the pursuit ; our whole train of stores being up, and
not even a wagon lost, except those abandoned on account of
breaking down.

We must leave here an account of the movements of Gen.
Bragg until the time shall come for us to see how his retreat
from Kentucky through Cumberland Gap transferred the inost
important scenes of the war in the "West to the memorable
lines of Nashville. Deplorable as was this retreat, it was not
without some circumstances that palliated it, or relieved the
grief of the public mind. It is certain that it was a disap-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK. 161

pointment to the enemy, who had expected to crush onr forces
in Kentucky, and were not prepared for the news of their liber-
ation from the coils which they flattered themselves had been
so industriously and elaborately woven around them.

It is probable, too, that under the circumstances, after oui
own army had blundered so badly in the first steps of the cam-
paign, its retreat from Kentucky, without the burden of defeat
and without material losses, was preferable to alternatives
which otherwise would have probably befallen it. It had en-
tered into Gen. Beauregard's plan of campaign in the West,
before he had been superseded, to regain the control of tlie
Tennessee and Cumberland rivers, and thus prepare for future
operations. The construction of works on the Cumberland
and Tennessee rivers so as to command them, was plainly an
important concern ; and, according to Gen. Beauregard's idea,
should have been preliminary to the active campaign in the
West. With these works, it appears probable that an advance
might have been made with safety into Kentuck}' ; and even
had we failed in the taking of Louisville and Cincinnati, which
was a part of Gen. Beauregard's plan, and been compelled to
fall back, it is thought not improbable that we could have
made a successful stand on the Cumberland. But Gen. Brag-ff
had failed to adopt these suggestions. Had he succeeded, after
our victory at Perry ville, in driving the enemy back to Louis-
ville, unless he had been able to take that place, he would have
been compelled to retreat so soon as the Tennessee and Cum-
berland rivers should have risen sufficiently to have admitted
the entrance of the enemy's gunboats and transports. Taking
this view, it may be said that as we did not have command of
these rivers, it was fortunate that our army left Kentucky when
it did, otherwise it might have found great ditficulty, alitor the
winter rains conmienced, in getting away at all.

For the failure of Gen. Bragg's campaign in Kentucky, the
excuse was offered that the people of that State had been un-
friendly, that they had not joined his standard in considerable
numbers, and that they had disappointed his own and the com-
mon expectation of the Southern public with respect to their
political sentiments. It is scarcely necessary to remark how
little applicable such an excuse is to positive blunders in the
conduct of an army, and to those imperfections of judgment

11 .

162 THE SKCOND TEAR OF THE WA"R.

and faults of strategy which, whatever may be their remote
connection, are the immediate occasions and responsible causes
of disaster.

Bat it is to be admitted that the South was bitterly disap-
pointed in the manifestations of public sentiment in Kentucky;
that the exhibitions of sympathy in this State were meagre and
sentimental, and amounted to but little practical aid of our
cause. Indeed, no snbjept was at once more dispiriting and
perplexing to the South than the cautious and unmanly recep-
tion given to our armies, both in Kentucky and Maryland.
The references we have made to the sentiment of each of these
States, leaves but little room to doubt the general conclusion,
that the dread of Yankee vengeance, and love of property,
were too powerful to make them take risks against these in
favor of a cause for which their people had a mere preference,
without any attachment to it higher than those of selfish calcu-
lation.

There must, indeed, be some explanation for the extraordi-
nary quiet of the people of Maryland and Kentucky under the
tyranny that ruled them, and for that submission the painful
signs of which we had unwillingly seen. This explanation was
not to be found in the conduct of the United States. It is a
remarkable fact that the Lincoln government had not taken
any pains to change the opinions and prejudices of the people
in these two States. It had made no attempt to conciliate
them ; it had performed no act calculated to awaken their
affection ; it had done nothing to convert their hearts to the
support of an administration to which they were originally
hostile.

It would be a foolish and brutal explanation to attribute the
submission of these States to cowardice. The people of these
States were brave ; they were descended from noble ancestiies,
and they had the same blood and types of race that were com-
mon to the South. The sons of Kentucky and Maryland who
had fought under the Confederate flag were as noble specimens
of the Southern soldier as any to be found in our armies. But
the people of these States, who had stayed at home and been
schooled in the lessons of submission, appeared to have lost the
spirit and stature of their ancestors, and dragged the names of
Maryland and Kentucky in the dust.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 163

Tlie only just explanation tliat can be furnisliecl of the abjec
attitude of these States is, that liaving taken the first steps o
submission to a pitiless despotism, they Jiad been easily cor
rupted into its subjects. The lessons of history furnish many
exhibitions of how easily the spirit of a community is crushed
by submission to tyranny ; how the practice of non-resistance
makes of men crawlino; creatures. The mistake is in making:
the first step of submission ; when that is accomplished, de-
moralization becomes rapid, and the bravest community sinks
into emasculation. Under the expf/iience of non-resistance to
the rule of a despot, men become timid, artful, and miserly ;
they spend their lives in consulting the little ends of personal
selfishness. This corruption in Kentucky, as well as in Mary-
land, had gone on with visible steps. Their history was a les-
son which the South might well I'emember, of the fatal conse-
quences of any submission to despotic will ; for however spe-
cious its plea, all records of man's experience have shown that
it undermines the virtues of a people, and degenerates at last
into servile acquiescence in its fate.

jCi THE SECOND YEAU OF THE WAE.

CHAPTER YI.

Our Lines in the Southwest. — Gen. Breckenridge's Attack on Baton Eouge. — De-
struction of the Rum Arkansas. — Gen. Price's Res 3rse at luka. — Desperate Fighting. —
The Battle of Corinth. — Van Dora's hasty E.xultations. — The Massacre of College
Hill. — Wild and terrible Courage of the Confederates. — Our Forces beaten Back. —
Our Lines of Retreat secured. — The Military Prospects of the South overshadowed.
— The Department of the Trans-Mississippi. — Romance of the War in Missouri. —
Schofield's Order calling out the Militia. — Atrocities of the Yankee Rule in Missouri.
— Robbery witnout "Red Tape." — The Guerilla Campaign. — The Atfair of Kirks-
ville. — E.^ecution of Col. McCullough. — Tlie Affair of Lone Jack. — Timely Reinforce-
ment of Le-xington by the Yankees. — The Palmyra Massacre. — The Question of Re-
taliation with the South. — The Military and Political Situation. — Survey of the
Military Situation. — Capture of Galveston by the Yankees. — The Enemy's Naval
Power, — His Iron-clads. — Importance of Foundries in the South. — Prospect in the
Southwest. — Prospect in Tennessee. — Prospect in Virginia. — Stuart's Raid into Penn-
sylvania.— Souvenirs of Southern Chivalry. — The "Soft-mannered Rebels." — Political
Comple.\ion of the War in the North. — Lincoln's " Emancipation Proclamation." —
History of Yankee Legislation in the War. — Political Error of the Emancipation Proo-
himation. — Its Etfect on the South. — The Decay of European Sympathy with the
Abolitionists. — What the War accomplished for Negro Slavery in the South. — Yankee
Falsehoods and Bravadoes in Europe.— Delusion of Conquering the South by Starva-
tion.— Caricatures in the New York Pictorials. — The noble Eloquence of Hunger and
Rags. — Manners in the South. — Yankee Warfare. — The Desolation of Virginia. — The
Lessons of harsh Necessity. — Improvement of the Civil Administration of the Con-
federacy.— Ordnance, Manufacturing Resources, Quartermasters' Supplies, etc.

The crisis in Kentucky was probably hastened by certain
disastrous events which had taken place on our lines in the
Southwest. A large Confederate force had been left in Korth
Mississippi when Gen. Bragg moved into Kentucky, and the
speculation was not remote that, with the Memphis and Charles-
ton railroad open from Chattanooga to a point near the posi-
tion of our army in Mississippi, that portion of our forces in
the West might render important assistance to, or, in some
emergenc}^ effect a co-operation with the armies that had been
marched into Kentucky.

But the story of the Southwest was one of almost unbroken
disaster, owing less, perhaps, to inadequate numbers than to
the blind and romantic generalship which carried them into
the jaws of destruction. There was one golden link in the
chain of events here, and that was the heroic defence of Vicks-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 165

bnrg. But while this famous town so nobly disputed the palm
of the Mississippi, her example of victorious resistance was
obscured, though not overshadowed, by other events in the
Southwest.

On tlie 5th of August, an attack made by Gen. Breckenridge
with les5 than three thousand men on Baton Rouge, was se-
verely repulsed by an enemy nearly twice his numbers, fight-
ing behind fortifications which were almost impregnable, and
assisted by a fleet of gunboats in the river. The unequal attack
was made by our troops with devoted courage ; they succeeded
in driving the enemy to the arsenal and tower, and to the
cover of his gunboats ; but they were compelled to withdraw
with diminished and exhausted numbers before a fire which it
was impossible to penetrate.

This check (for it deserves no more important or decisive
title) was in a measure occasioned, or, at least, was accompa-
nied, by a disaster of real importance. This was the destruc-
tion of the great Confederate ram Arkansas, already famous
for having run the gauntlet of the hostile fleet at Yicksburg,
and the promises of whose future services had given to the
South many brilliant but illusory hopes. The Arkansas left
Yicksburg to co-operate in the attack upon Baton Rouge.
After passing Bayou Sara her machinery became deranged or
disabled. But two alternatives were left — to blow her up or
suffer her to be captured by the Yankee gunboats. The for-
mer was resorted to, and this proud achievement of naval
architecture floated a wreck on the Mississippi river.

The failure of another enterprise of attack on the enemy,
made by Gen. Price at luka on the 20th of September, was
much more disastrous than the aflfair of Baton Rouge. Over-
matched by numbers, Gen. Price was, after some partial and
temporary success, forced back, with a loss greater than that
of the enemy. In this engagement our loss was probably eight
hundred in killed and wounded. But never had troops fought
with more terrible resolution or wilder energy than the soldiers
of Price. The fighting was almost hand to hand ; and as an
instance of the close and deadly combat, it may be mentioned
that an Ohio battery was taken by our men four diflerent
times, and as often retaken by greatl}^ superior numbers of the
enemy. The desperation of our soldiers astonished those who,

166 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

bj the weiglit of numbers *alone, were able to resist them.
Several of our men endeavored to tear the colors from the
hands of the Yankees by main force, and either perished in the
attempt or were made prisoners. In one spot next morning,
tliere were counted seventeen Confederate soldiers lying dead
around one of their officers. Sixteen feet square would cover
the whole space where they died.

But there was yet to ensue the great disaster which was to
react on other theatres of the war and cast the long shadow of
misfortune upon the country of the West. It was destined to
take place at Corinth, where Major-gen. Rosecrans, command-
ing the Yankee army of the Mississippi and Tennessee, was
stationed with at least forty thousand men.

THE BATTLE OP CORINTH.

Tlie armies of Generals Yan Dorn and Price — under Gen.
Yan Dorn as the ranking officer — having formed a junction at
Ripley, marched thence for the purpose of engaging the enemy
in battle, though it was well known that the battle must be
wagtid under the serious disadvantages of great disparity in
numbers and strength of position.

On the 2d of October our forces marched from Pocahontas
to Chewalla, points on the Memphis and Charleston railroad,
thus moving from the west on Corinth, the stronghold of the
enemy. That night the soldiers rested on their arms, in eager
and confident expectation of meeting the foe in battle array on
the ensuing morning.

On Friday, October 3d, the order of battle was formed — the
right being held by Gen. Yan Dorn's troops, composing only
one division, under Gen. Lovell ; while the left was occupied
by Gen. Price's troops, composed of two divisions — the extreme
left under Gen. Herbert, and the right under Gen. Maury,
whose division, as thus placed, formed the centre of the whole
force. Advancing in this order, at half past 7 o'clock in the
morning Gen. Lovell's division arrived within lons^ ranije of the
enemy, who had marched out some miles in front of tiie extreme
outer lines of his fortifications. Immediately the artillery of
Gen. Yillipigue, whose brigade was in the advance, opened fire
upon the enemy, who in a short time began to give way and

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 167

fall back, and continued to do so for two hours, under a heavy
and eifective lire from the advancing batteries of Gen. Lovell's
division.

At half-past 9 o'clock, the enemy having made a stand one
half mile in front of his fortifications. Gen, Lovell advanced his
infantry and poured a destructive musketry fire into the ranks
of the Yankees, who rej)lied with spirit ; and now, Gen. Price
liaving ordered up his divisions under Generals Maury and
Herbert, the battle raged all along the line — the enem}' suffer-
ing terribl}'. At length a charge was ordered, Gen. Lovell's
division leading. In double-quick time our soldiers, pressing
forward with loud cheers, drove the enemy behind his intrench-
nients. Simultaneously almost, the divisions of Gen. Maury
and Herbert, the one after the other, charged the enemy in
front of them with equal success.

There was now a strange lull in the battle. The Yankees
had withdrawn entirely behind their fortifications, their fire
had dropped off, and the tumult of the fierce strife died away.
The unexpected quiet lasted for a whole hour. By that time,
the Yankees having brought several field batteries in front,
opened from these, and at the same time from his heavy artil-
lery, a most tremendous cannonade. This fire was directed
chiefiy, if not wholly, against the right wing under Gen. Lovell,
and, though so tremendous in sound, produced but little effect.
Our soldiers remained silent and stood firm. They were wait-
ing for orders. Presently the second charge was ordered.
Gallantly was it made by Gen. Lovell's division, arid as gal-
lantly was it supported by charges all along the centre and
right wing by the divisions of Generals Maury and Herbert. On,
on our glorious colunnis swept through the leaden rain and
iron hail ; the first line of fortifications is reached and passed ;
and the Yankees do not stop until they have reached the next
line of intrenchments.

On Friday night the news of a great victory was dispatched
by Gen. Yan Dorn to Richmond. This announcement was
made with an exultation so hasty and extreme, that it is to be
supposed that this commander was entirely unaware of the
strength of the enemy's works at Corinth, and, consequently,
of the supreme trial which yet remained for the courage and
devotion of his troops.

168 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

The next morning the general relation of our troops to each
other and to the enemy remained as it was on the previous
day — Gen. Yan Dorn, in supreme command, occupying the
centre, Gen. Price the left wing, and Gen. Lovell the right
wing.. Gen. Lovell's division held ground M^est of Corinth and
just south of the Memphis and Charleston railroad. Gen.
Maury's division was posted north of the Memphis and
Charleston railroad, and between it and the Memphis and
Ohio railroad. Gen. Herbert's division was on the left, east
of the Memphis and Ohio railroad — thus advancing from the
north upon Corinth.

The battle was commenced by Gen. Price early in the morn-
ing, one half-hour before daylight. The artillery having been
moved forward, opened upon the enemy in his intrenchmenta
at a distance of four hndred yards. The enemy replied, and
a heavy cannonading, by both sides, ensued for one hour.
Our troops suffered but little damage from this fire, and the
artillery was withdrawn with the view of advancing the infan-
try. Now heavy skirmishing followed all along the line, which
was kept up until about 10 o'clock. Then beginning with
Gen. Lovell's division, who were immediately seconded by
Gen. Price's army — Gen. Herbert's division first, and then
Gen. Maury's, — our whole line advanced upon the intrench-
ments of the enemy.

Here occurred one of the most terrible struggles of the war.
The shock of the tremendous onset was terrible. One portion
of our lines rushed pell-mell into Corinth, losing in their con-
fidence of victory almost every semblance of order, infantry
and cavalry being crowded together in a dense mass, wild
with excitement, and rending the air with fierce and exulting
yells. But the batteries of the enemy were situated to com-
mand the village as well as the approaches to it.

The serried ranks of the enemy, now prepared to receive
us, afforded convincing proof that victory was yet distant from
our grasp, and that a hard and bloody fight was at hand. A
portion of Maury's division was ordered to charge the formi-
dable fort on College Hill. This was the forlorn liope. Dis-
appointed in gaining a lodgment in the village, we must con-
fess to a defeat, if that battery be not taken. Once in our pos-
session, the town is ours. The men, massed in single column,

THE SECOND YEAR OF TnE WAE. 1G9

eiglit deep, moved forward in silence, regardless of the shower
of bullets which whistled about their ears and decimated their
ranks. The decisive moment — the turning point of the en-
gagement— had arrived. Every battery of the enemy bearing
on the column was double charged with grape and canister,
which burst over the heads of our troops. Scores were killed
at every discharge, but they moved steadily on, maintaining
the silence of the grave. As fast as one soldier fell, his com-
rade behind stepped forward and took his place. They
charged up to the battery, reserving their fire until they
reached the parapets. Twice repulsed, the third time they
reached the outer works, and planted their flag upon the es-
carpment. It was shot down and again planted, but shot
down again.

These devoted troops now held partial possession of the
works. But the triumph w'as of short duration. According
to previous instructions, the enemy's gunners fell back behind
the works, and the next instant from their batteries threw a
murderous fire into our ranks at the shortest possible range.
Nothing human could withstand such a fire ; the confusion it
produced was irretrievable ; our men were driven back and
the day lost. ~'

But the attack was not abandoned without instances of wild
and terrible courage that were almost appalling. In their
madness and desperation, our men would rush up to the very
mouths of the cannon, and many were blown to pieces by the
rapid and constant discharges. Such spectacles of courage
were curious and terrible to behold. An officer, standing a
little way out from his men, was shouting, " Give it to the
scoundrels." The words had but passed from his lips, when
the first shell from a Parrott gun struck his left shoulder, tear-
ing off his whole side. He turned his head a little to one side,
his mouth opened, his eyes glared, and he fell dead.

The attack on the enemy's batteries was rash and magnifi-
cent. The intensity of the fight may be judged from the fact
that two hundred and sixty dead bodies were found in and
about the trenches, within a distance of fifty feet of the works.
It is impossible to enumerate the examples of daring which
adorn the story of this attack. The Second Texas Infantry,
under Col. Rogers, led the charge, and the colonel himself fell

170 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK.

on the enemy's breastworks, with the colors of his regiment in
his hand. A piece of paper was found under his clothiug,
giving his name and rank and the address of his friends. As
Gen. Cabell mounted the enemy's parapet, the first man he
encountered was a Yankee colonel, who cried out, " Kill that
d d rebel officer." The next instant a blow from the gen-
eral's sabre placed his antagonist at his feet. In tlie brigade
of this brave officer, J. H. Bullock, adjutant of the 13th Ar-
kansas regiment, a noble specimen of the Southern soldier —
for, though blessed in estate and family, a son-in-law of Chief-
justice Parsons, of North Carolina, and the master of a beauti-
ful and prosperous home, he had volunteered as a private and
been advanced for merit — made a display of courage to ani-
mate his men that was a splendid picture of heroism, as he
stood out and exposed himself to the enemy's fire until his
clothing was pierced by balls, his life being saved only by that
unseen shield with which Providence protects its agents. The
gallant commander of this ever-glorious regiment. Col. Daly,
had fallen, while himself engas-ed in the animation of his men —
cheering and leading them on to the attack.

Under the necessities of the case, our troops had fallen
back ; and though in doing so they were exposed to a terrible
and destructive fire, there was no panic, no rout — the wounded,
except those who fell right at the intrenchments, having been
nearly all brought away. Our army retired to the woods at a
distance of only six hundred yards, and there, while our artil-
lery resumed fire and kept it up for a short time, formed again
in order of battle. But the enemy appearing indisposed to
renew the conflict. Gen. Yan Dorn, at three o'clock, drew off
his whole force, being most ably supported in doing so by Gen.
Price and the other general officers.

The next morning, at half past eight o'clock, our advance,
consisting of Gen. Phifer's brigade, and Col. Whitfield's Le-
gion, with one battery — not exceeding one thousand five hun-
dred in all — crossed the Davis bridge at Hatchie river, to
engage the enemy, a large body of whom, from Bolivar, had
the day before reached that point, and had there been held in
check by Col. Slemmon's and Adams' cavalry, with one bat-
tery. Our advance having crossed the bridge and gone a little
distance, received a heavy fire at short range from a concealed

THE SECXDND TEAR OF THE WAR, 171

battery, which was followed directly by a charge from a largely
Buperior force. Our troops retreated in a good deal of confu-
sion across the bridge — having suffered a loss, perhaps, of three
hundred killed, wounded, and missing. The reinforcements
arriving, our troops formed in line, and a fight with musketry
ensued and was kept up for some time across the river, but
with very little loss on our side. Meanw^hile, our field-pieces
opened upon the enemy — and they replying, cannonading was
continued during the greater part of the day. During this
time our advance Avas gradually withdrawn, and following the
other troops, with the long wagon train of supplies, wounded,
(fee. — the artillery having also been brought off — made a suc-
cessful crossing of Hatchie river, some miles higher up the
stream. The retreat was eventually halted at a point a little
north of Ripley.

Our loss in all the three days' engagements was probably
quite double that of the enemy. In killed and wounded it ex-
ceeded three thousand ; and it was estimated, besides, that we
had left more than fifteen hundred prisoners in the hands of
the enemy.

The defeat of Corinth was followed by swift news of disaster
and discouragement. The military prospect was not dark, but
it had lost much of the brightness it had only a few weeks
before. Kentucky had been gloomily abandoned. In Vir-
ginia the hopes of conquering a peace on the Potomac had for
the time been given up ; the Kanawha Yalley had again been
mostly surrendered to the enemy ; and Marshall's forces, back
again in Southwestern Virginia, were consuming the sub-
stance of the country with but little return of other service.
In other parts of the Confederacy, the prospect was not much
relieved.

THE DEPARTMENT OF THE TRANS-MISSISSIPPI.

The events in the department of the Trans-Mississippi were
too distant to affect the general fortunes of the war ; they were
but episodes to the great drama of arms that passed over the
broad and imposing theatres of Virginia, Kentucky, and Ten-
nessee; but they were replete with romance, and if their inter-
est is at present partial, it is so, perhaps, for the reason that
they are imperfectly known.

172 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

Missouri had the better of other seats of hostility for the real
romance of war. The remote geography of the country, the
rough character of the people, the intensity and ferocity of the
passions excited, and the reduction of military operations to a
warfare essentially partisan and frontier, gave to the progress
of the war in this quarter a wild aspect, and illustrated it with
rare and thrilling scenes.

Gen. Schofield, the Yankee commander, who had been left
by Halleck with the brief and comprehensive instructions " to
take care of Missouri," found the power of the Confederates
broken in nearly three-fourths of that State, but the South-
western portion threatened by the active movements of Gen.
Hindraan, in command of State forces raised in Arkansas and
Texas. But in no part of Missouri was the spirit of the people
broken. Guerrilla bands made their appearance in all parts
of the State; and their numbers rapidly- augmented under the
despotic edict of Schofield, calling out the militia of the State
to murder their own countrymen.

The dark atrocities of the Yankee rule in Missouri, enacted
as they were in a remote country, and to a great extent re-
moved from observation, surpassed all that was known in
other parts of the Confederacy of the cruelty and fury of the
enemy. The developments on this subject are yet imperfect ;
but some general facts are known of the inordinate license of
the enemy in Missouri, while others of equal horror have es-
caped the notice of the public.

In other parts of the Confederacy many of the excesses of
the enemy were performed under certain formalities, and to
some extent regulated by them. But in Missouri there was no
'• red tape," no qualification of forms ; the order of the day
was open robbery, downright murder, and freedom to all crimes
of which " rebels" were the victims. Citizens were plundered
with barefaced audacity. Those citizens of St. Louis county
alone, who were suspected by Gen. Schofield to sympathize
with the South, were taxed five hundred thousand dollars to
arm, clothe, and subsist those who were spilling the blood of
their brothers, and threatening their own homes with the torch
iind with outrages to which death is preferable.

The sanguinary guerrilla warfare in Missouri may be said to
have commenced in the month of July, by the assembling of

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 173

bands under Porter, Poindexter, Cobb, and others. The prin-
cipal theatre of guerrilla operations was at this time the north-
eastern division of Missouri, where the almost devilish cruelties
of the Yankee commander, the notorious Colonel McNeil, had
lashed the people into incontrollable furj.

On the 6th of August, Porter's band was attacked at Kirks-
ville by McNeil with a large force of cavalry and six pieces of
artillery. This gallant partisan made a resistance of four
hours against overwhelming numbers, and retired only after
such a demonstration of valor, leaving the Yankees to claim
as a victory an affair in which they had sustained a loss of
more than five hundred in killed and wounded, probably double
our own.

The day after the action, a party of Yankee scouts suc-
ceeded in capturing, near Edina, Col. F. McCullough, who was
attached to Porter's command, and at the time of his capture
was quite alone. The next morning a train with an armed
escort proceeded from Edina to Kirksville. McCullough was
sent along. On arriving at Kirksville, the news of the capture
of this famous partisan excited the most devilish feeling among
the Yankee truops. He was confined a brief time with the
prisoners. Meantime a court-martial was held, and he was
sentenced to be shot that very afternoon. He received the
information of his fate with perfect composure, but protested
against it. Leaning against the fence, he wrote a few lines to
his wife. These, witTi his watch, he delivered to the officer, to
• be given to her. Upon the way to his execution, he requested
the privilege to give the command to fire, which was granted.
All being ready, he said : "What I have done, I have done as
a principle of right. Aim at the heart. Fire !"

The command taking the soldiers by surprise, one fired
sooner than the rest. The ball entering his breast, he fell,
while the other shots passed over him. Falling with one leg
doubled under the body, he requested to have it straightened
out. "While this was being done he said: "I forgive you for
this barbarous act." The squad having reloaded their pieces,
another volley was fired — this time into his body, and he died.

On the 15th of August occurred the more important action
of Lone Jack. Large Yankee forces were moved from Lex-
ington, with orders to effect a junction near Lone Jack and

174 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAE.

attack the forces under Hughes and Quantrell, supposed to "be
somewhere in Jackson county. The disaster which met the
Yankees here was the most serious of the guerrilla campaign.
Their command was defeated, with a loss of three hundred
killed and wounded, two pieces of their artillery captured on
the field, their routed forces turned back upon Lexington, and
that place put in imminent peril. The timely reinforcement of
Lexington by all the available forces of the enemy in north-
eastern Missouri alone saved the place from capture by the
Confederates, and disconcerted their plans of relieving their
comrades north of the river.

The guerrilla campaign of Missouri is made memorable by the
fearful story of the '' Palmyra massacre." The important
incidents of this tragedy are gathered from the enemy's own
publications, and it was from Yankee newspapers that the peo-
ple of the South first learned the barbarous and exultant news
that McNeil had executed ten Confederate prisoners because a
tory and spy had been carried oflf a captive by our forces.

From the enemy's own accounts, it appears that the missing
man, Andrew Allsman, was a legitimate prisoner of war ; that
on the descent of the Confederate forces upon Palmyra he
was captured by them ; that he belonged to the Federal
cavalry, but that being too old to endure all the hardships of
active duty, he was detailed as a spy, being " frequently," as
one of the Yankee papers states, "called upon for information
touching the loyalty of men, which he always gave to the ex-
tent of his ability."

When McNeil returned to Palmyra in October, he caused a
notice to be issued that unless Allsman was returned in ten
days he would shoot ten Confederate prisoners as " a meet
reward for their crimes, among which was the illegal restrain-
ing of said Allsman of his liberty." Tiie ten days elapsed,
and the prisoner wag not returned. The following account of
what ensued, is condensed from the Palmyra Courier^ a
" Union" journal, without any variation from the language in
which it describes the deed of the demons with whom it was in
sympathy :

"The tenth day expired with last Friday. On that day ten
rebel prisoners, already in custody, were selected to pay with
their lives the penalty demanded. A little after 11 o'clock,

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 175

A. M., the next day, three government wagons drove to the jaih
One contained fonr, and each of the others three rongh board
coifins. The condemned men were conducted from the prison
and seated in the wagons, one npon each coffin. A sufficient
guard of soldiers accompanied them, and the cavalcade started
for the fatal grounds. The ten coffins were removed from the
wagons and placed in a row, six or eight feet apart, forming a
line north and south. Each coffin was placed upon the ground
with its foot west and head east. Thirty soldiers of the 2d M.
S. M. were drawn up in a single line, extending north and
south, facing the row of coffins. The arrangements completed,
the men knelt upon the grass between their coffins and the
soldiers. At the conclusion of a prayer by the army chaplain,
each prisoner took his seat upon the foot of his coffin, facing
the muskets which in a few moments were to launch them into
eternity. They were nearly all firm and undaunted. The most
noted of the ten was Captain Thomas A. Sidner of Monroe
county, whose capture at Shelbyville, in the disguise of a
woman, we related several weeks since. He was now elegantly
attired in a suit of black broadcloth, with a white vest. A
luxurious growth of beautiful hair rolled down upon his
shoulders, which, with his fine personal appearance, could not
but bring to mind the handsome but vicious Absalom. There
was nothing especially worthy of note in the appearance of
the others. A few moments after 1 o'clock the chaplain in
attendance shook hands with the prisoners. Two of them ac-
cepted bandages for the eyes, the rest refused. A hundred
spectators had gathered around the amphitheatre to witness the
impressive scene. The stillness of death pervaded the place.
The officer in command now stepped forward, and gave the
word of command — ' Keady ! aim ! fire !' The discharges, how-
ever, were not made simultaneously — probably througli want
of a perfect understanding of the orders to fire. Two of the
rebels fell backwards upon their coffins and died instantly.
Capt. Sidner sprang forward and fell with his head towards the
soldiers, his face upwards, his hands clasped upon his breast,
and the left leg drawn half way up. He did not move again,
but died immediately. He had requested the soldiers to aim
at his heart, and they obeyed but too implicitly. The other

176 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

seven were not killed outright ; so the reserves were called in,
who dispatched them with their revolvers."

The "Palmyra massacre " was destined to a long and painful
remembrance by the people of the South, not only because of
its tragic interest, but because it was a comment scrawled in
blood on that weak and remiss policy of our government, which
had so long submitted to the barbarous warfare of the enemj
and hesitated at the rule of retaliation.

THE MILITARY AND POLITICAL SITUATION.

A slight survey of the military situation at this time adds
something to the list of our disasters, and is necessary to un-
derstand the proportions of the crisis at which the fortunes of
the South had arrived.

The capture of Galveston on the coast of Texas, on the 9th
of October, was another repetition of the almost invariable
story of disaster at the hands of the enemy's naval power. It
was made almost without resistance. In the early part of the
war, the defenceless condition of Galveston had been repre-
sented to the government, as in fact there was no ordnance
available there but a lot of old cannon captured from the
United States. These representations in the letters and peti-
tions of the people of Galveston were made without effect,
until at last, some time in the summer of 1861, a deputation
of citizens waited upon the authorities at Richmond, begging
piteously a few cannon to defend them from the enemy. The
whole extent of the response of the government to this and
other appeals was to send to Galveston eleven or thirteen guns,
two of which were rifled ; and transportation for these was
only given to New Orleans, whence they had to be dragged
over piney hills and through swamps to their destination. The
consequence was, that the enemy had made an easy prize of
one of our principal seaports: when, after threatening it for
eighteen months, he at last found it practically defenceless.

The fall of Galveston again turned the perplexed attention
of the people of the South to the enormous and rapid increase
of the enemy's naval power in this war as one of its most pain-
ful subjects of, interest. This arm had grown to such size as
to threaten us in many respects more seriously than the ene-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 177

my's land forces. It was calculated that, with the completion
of their vast number of naval structures already on the stocks,
the Yankees would have 388 vessels, mounting 3,072 guns —
nearly nine guns to the vessel. Of these, thirty M'ere iron-
clad, mounting ninety of the heaviest guns in the world, each
weighing 42,240 pounds, and throwing a solid shot, fifteen
inches in diameter, weighing 480 pounds.

It is not wonderful that in view of these vast preparations
in the North, the people of the South should have watched
witli intense interest the long lines of their sea-coast, and been
on the tiptoe of expectation for the fleets of the Yankees,
which were to sweep upon them in numbers and power yet un-
equalled by any naval demonstration of the enemy in this war.
It was easy to see that the South would have to look to its
foundries to set-off the naval power of the enemy. When we
could match their naval armaments with our batteries on shore,
we might expect to hold our sea-coast against their fleets. The
authorities at Kichmond were instructed that there was but one
way of replying to the Yankee iron-clads on equal terms ;
and that was by iron-clad batteries, with powerful guns in
them, and with the use of steel-pointed or wrought-iron pro-
jectiles.

In the Southwest, the strong tenure which we maintained
of Yicksburg was a stumbling-block to the Yankee schemes for
the conquest of Mississippi. The fate of that State was also
confidently intrusted to the brave troops under the command
of Gen. Pemberton, who was assisted by Yan Dorn and Price
and an increasing army.

But it was to Tennessee that the minds of the intelligent
were turned to look for the earliest and severest conflict of the
campaign in the West. The enemy already held the western
portion of the State and a part of the middle, and evidently
desired to obtain possession of the eastern portion. He was
reported to be coming down from Kentucky for the purpose,
in heavy columns, under Gen. Eoseerans, by way of Nash-
ville ; and there was reason to suppose that he would endeavor
to make a flank movement on Knoxville, and, at the same
time, capture Chattanooga, as the key of JSTorth Alabama and
Georgia.

In Virginia a lull had followed the famous summer campaign,

12

178 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE.

and our army in the northern part of the State quietlj re-
cruited, and was daily improving in organization and numbers.
The only incident that had broken the monotony of our camps
was the renewal in the North of the phantom of " invasion by
the rebels" by a raid into Pennsylvania, accomplished by the
rapid and brilliant commander of our cavalry. Gen. J. E. B.
Stuart, with about two thousand men. The expedition pene-
trated to Chambersburg, which was occupied for a short time
by our troops on the 10th of October. It met with no resist-
ance, accumulated no stores, and accomplished nothing beyond
the results of a reconnoissance, and the wonder of one of the
most rapid marches on record.

This expedition left to the Yankees a remarkable souvenir
of Southern chivalry. Private property was uniformly re-
spected by our troops ; Yankee civilians were treated with
scrupulous regard ; and many kindnesses were shown the
alarmed people in a knightly style, Avhich would have been
creditable to us had it not been made ridiculous by excess of
courtesy and a tender and ceremonious politeness which was
in very absurd contrast to the manners of our enemy. On en-
tering Chambersburg, " the soft-mannered rebels," as Col.
McClure, the Yankee commander of the post, described them,
treated him with the most tender politeness. Indeed, the nar-
rative of this officer's experience furnishes a curious* leaf in
the history of the war. To the great amusement of the peo-
ple of the North, Col. McClure gave a long account in the
newspapers of the strained chivalry of our troops. He re-
lated how they had " thanked him for being candid," when he
told them that he was a Republican ; how he was politely asked
for food by the officers ; and how a private in Stuart's terrible
command had, " with a profound bow, asked for a few coals to
light a fire."

The story of these courtesies and salaams to our enemy is
not one for our amusement. It affords an instructive illustra-
tion that is valuable in history, of the over-amiable disposition
and simple mind of the South ; and it places in stark and hor-
rible contrast an agreeable pictnre with that of the devilish
atrocities and wanton and mocking destruction of the Yankee
armies on the soil of the Confederacy.

While the war lagged, we are called upon to notice new

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 179

sources of resolution and power in the South, which were per-
haps more vahiable than victories in the field. In this depart-
ment of interest, which is quite equal to that of battles and
sieges, it will be necessary to pass in review some political
acts of the rival governments, and some events of moral import-
ance.

At last the Abolitionists of the North had had their wild
and wicked will. On the 22d day of September, President
Lincoln issued his celebrated proclamation of " emanci^^a-
tion"* of the slaves of the South, to take eflect after the 1st of
next January, thus unmasking the objects of the war, and ex-
hibiting to the world the sublime of administrative madness.

* The following is a copy of this remarkable document :

BY THE PKESIDEKT OF THE XJNITED STATES — A PBOCX,AMATION.

Washington, Sept. 22, 1863.

I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of America, and Com-
mander-in-Chief of the army and navy thereof, do hereby proclaim and de-
clare, that hereafter, as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted for the object of
practically restoring the constitutional relation between the United States and
the people thereof, in which States that relation is, or may be, suspended or
disturbed ; that it is my purpose, upon the next meeting of Congress, to again
recommend the adoption of a practical measure tendering pecuniary aid to the
free acceptance or rejection of all the slave States, so called, the people whereof
may not then be in rebellion against the United States, and which States may
then have voluntarily adopted or thereafter may voluntarily adopt the imme-
diate or gradual abolishment of slavery within their respective limits ; and that
the efforts to colonize persons of African descent, with their consent, upon the
continent or elsewhere, with the previously obtained consent of the govern-
ments existing there, will be continued ; that on the 1st day of January, in the
year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held
as slaves within any State, or any designated part of a State, the people where-
of shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be thenceforward
and forever free ; and the executive government of the United States, includ-
#ig the naval and military authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the
freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or
any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom ; that the
Executive will, on the 1st day of January, aforesaid, by proclamation, designate
the States and parts of States, if any, in which the people thereof respectively
shall then be in rebellion against the United States ; and the fact that any
State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be in good faith represented in
the Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto at elections
wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have participated,
shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive
evidence that such State and the people thereof have not been in rebellioa
against the United States.

180 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

Since the commencement of the war, the Abolitionists had
gradually compassed their ends at Washington, or rather the
real objects and inhei-ent spirit of the war had been gradually
developed. They had legislated slavery forever out of the
Territories; they had abolished it in the District of Columbia;
they had passed laws confiscating the property of " rebels"
and emancipating their slaves, and declaring all fugitive slaves
free within their military lines; they had made it a crime on
the part of their military officers to restore or aid in restoring
any fugitive slave to his master ; and finally, they had pro-
cured Irom President Lincoln a proclamation declaring all the
slaves in the Confederate States, beyond the lines of their land
and naval forces, " henceforward and forever free."

This infamous proclamation, while regarded by the South as
a fulmination of exasperated passion, was in the North a source
of weakness and division. It divided the North and strength-
ened the enemies of Mr. Lincoln's administration without cre-
ating any enthusiasm among its friends. The few in the North
who still had some regard for the written constitution under
which they lived, contended that the President could not pro-
claim emancipation except under the pressure of military ne-
cessity, and what sort of a military necessity, it was asked, was
that which admitted of a delay of a hundred days. ThQfulmen
hrtttum issued to appease the anti-slavery party proved a fire-
brand at home. Many, even of this party, were dissatisfied,
and decried the proclamation because of its tardiness. "There
was a time," said the New York Tribune^ "when even this bit
of paper could have brought the negro to our side; but now
slavery, the real rebel capital, has been surrounded by a Cbick-

And I do hereby enjoin upon and order all persons engaged in tlie militsl^
and naval service of the United States to observe, obey, and enforce within
their respective spheres of service the act and sections above recited.

And the Executive will in due time recommend that all citizens of the
United States, who shall have remained loyal thereto throughout the rebellion,
shall (upon the restoration of the constitutional relation between the United
States and their respective States and people, if the relation shall have been
suspended or disturbed) be compensated for all losses by acts of the United
States, including the loss of slaves.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the
United States to be affixed.

Abraham Lmcouj.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 181

aliominy swamp of blunders and outrages against that race
which wo paper spade can dig through."

To the South the fuhnination of Lincoln was a crowning
proof of the true principles of the party that had elevated him
to the Presidency, and that on its accession to power had made
perfidious use of the most solemn pledges."*^ It was a public '^
confession of the fact that conquest, extermination, and eman-
cipation were the real objects of the war — a fact which the
enemy for a while had affected to deny. It attempted to ac-
complish by the liorrors of servile insurrection what our enemy
had failed to accomplish by military operations. It confessed
to the world his inability and failure to accomplish his pur- /v^-v

* One of the most singular juxtapositions between tlie professions of the
North at the commencement of hostilities and its present ideas, is aiForded in
Mr. Seward's famous letter, written to the French government on the 22d April,
1861, and his subsequent circular to the Yankee ministers in Europe. It is
one of the most singular of all the juggleries and summersaults of Yankee
diplomacy.

In the first pronunciamento of Secretary Seward, written " by the direction
of the President," occurs the following passage :

"The condition of slavery in the several States will renmin just the same,
whether it succeeds or fails. The rights of the States, and the condition of
every human being in them, will remain subject to exactly the same laws and
form of administration, whether the revolution shall succeed or whether it
shall fail. Their constitutions, and laws, and customs, habits, and institutions,
in either case will remain the same. It is hardly necessary to add to this
incontestable statement, the further fact that the new President, as well as the
citizens through whose suffrages he has come into the administration, has
always repudiated all designs whatever, and wherever imputed to him and
them, of disturbing the system of slavery as it is existing under t/ie co7istitution
and laws. The case, however, would not be fully presented were I to omit to
say that any such effort on his part would be unconstitutional, and all his acts
in that direction would be prevented by the judicial authority, even though
they were assented to by Congress and the people."

'.• Within eighteen months after Seward declares officially to one of the minis-
ters of the government that the President has no wish and no right to inter-
fere with the institutions of the "rebellious" States, he writes another letter,
also directed to the ministers abroad, announcing the adoption of a policy
which, if it could be carried out, wovdd make a complete revolution in the
social organization of the South. Utterly regardless of his former position and
declaration, he undertakes to justify the " emancipation" proclamation of the
Yankee President. But this is not all. What shall we say of the effrontery
of the lie, when Seward asserts that the abolition proclamation is not only a
just and proper act, but avows his belief that the world will recognize "the
moderation and magnanimity with which the gocernment proceeds in a matter
go solemn and important J"

182 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

poses by regular and honorable hostilities. It was, in short,
the diabolical attempt of an infatuated ruler, unworthy of
authority, in a fit of disappointed malice, to inflict the worst
horrors known to human nature upon eight millions of people
who had wisely rejected his authority.

The " emancipation" proclamation not only strengthened
the South and nerved her to greater exertions in the war, but
it fortunately gave occasion to the world for a more interested
observation and closer study of the peculiar institution of the
Confederacy. The sympathies of Europe with the anti-slaveiy
party in America were depressed by the conduct of that party,
its exhibitions of ferocity, and by the new manifestations which
the war had made of the nature and moral condition of negro
slavery in the South.

Indeed, the war had shown the system of slavery in the
South to the M'orld in some new and striking aspects, and had
removed much of that cloud of prejudice, defamation, false-
hood, romance, and perverse senmnentalism through which our
peculiar institution had been formerly known to Europe. It
had given a better vindication of our system of slavery than
all the books that could be written in a generation. It had
shown that slavery was an element of strength with us ; that
it had assisted us in our struggle ; that no servile insurrections
had taken place in the South, in spite of the allurements of our
enemy ; that the slave had tilled the soil while his master had
fought; that in large districts unprotected by our troops, and
with a white population consisting almost exclusively of women
and children, the slave had continued at his work quiet, cheer-
ful, and faithful ; and that, as a conservative element in our
social system, the institution of slavery had withstood the
shocks of war, and been a faithful ally of our arms, although
instigated to revolution by every art of the enemy, and
prompted to the work of assassination and pillage by the most
brutal examples of the Yankee soldiery.*

* The missionary settlements of tlie Yankees on the coast of South Caro-
lina -were an acknowledged failure, so far as the proposed education and exalta-
tion of the blacks were concerned. The appearance of the ancient town of
Beaufort, since it had fallen into the enemy's possession, indicated the peculiari-
ties of Yankee rule, and afforded an interesting exhibition of their relations
with the negro. The inhabitants had taken nothing away with them but theii

C EN J E B. STUART.

-xkgn frcTn Tire.

inferaved for the Second'Yeax of fh.e'War.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 183

Since the commencement of the war the North had had
almost exclusive access to the ear of the world, and had poured
into it whatever of slander or of misrepresentation human in-
genuity could suggest. This circumstance, which was at first
thought to be a great disadvantage to us, had not only proved
a harmless annoyance, but had resulted, in invaluable benefit.
It had secured sympathy for us; it had excited the inquiries of
the intelligent, who, after all, give the law to public opinion ;
and it had naturally tempted the Korth to such lying and
bravado as to disgust the world.

At the beginning of the war the North had assured the
world that the people of the South were a sensual and bar-
barous people, demoralized by their institution of slavery, and
depraved by self-will and licentiousness below the capacity for
administrative government. The best reply to these slanders,
was our conduct in this war. Even the little that was known
in Europe of the patriotic devotion, the dignity and cultivated
humanity of the people of the South, as shown in the war, had
been sufiicient to win unbounded encomiums for them. We
had not only withstood for nearly two years a power which had
put thirteen hundred thousand men in the field ; but we had

personal property and their valuable domestic slave servants. The furniture
was left untouched in the houses. These houses were OAvned by the Barnwella,
the Rhetts, the Cuthberts, the Phillipses, and other distinguished families of
North Carolina. The elegant furniture, the libraries, the works of art, had
nearly all disappeared. They had been sent North from time to time by Yankee
officers, and many of these officers of high rank. Tlie elegant dwelling-houses
had been converted into barracks, negro quarters, hospitals, and storehouses.
The best houses had been put in complete order, and were occupied by the
officers of the department and the abolitionist missionaries from Boston and
elsewhere. The efforts of these missionaries to teach the negroes their letters
and habits of cleanliness met with no success. Beaufort was full of negroes,
well clothed, at government expense, fat, saucy, and lazy. The town looked
dirty and disorderly, and had the appearance of a second-class Mexican village.
Some of the missionaries had been elevated to the position of planters, and
occupied the estates of the old Carolinians. The labor on these estates was
performed by contraband negroes. These abolition lords assumed all the
hauteur and dignity of the Southern planter. The only difference to the black
laborer was that he had the name of freeman ; his labor was as unrelenting aa
ever. Massachusetts missionaries and Massachusetts speculators enjoyed the
larger share of government patronage here. The department of Hunter ap-
peared to be experimenting in attempts to elevate a negro to equality with the
white man. Military operations were secondary considerations.

184: THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAR.

shown that we were a people able in public affairs, resolute,
brave, and prudent.

Anotlier characteristic Yankee misrepresentation, made to
the world about this time on the subject of the war, was, that
it was to be concluded at an early day by the force of destitu-
tion and suffering in the South. The delusion of conquering
the "rebels" by famine easily caught the vulgar ear. The
liorth made it a point to exaggerate and garble every thing it
could find in Southern newspapers, of the ragged condition of
our armies, the high prices of the necessaries of life, and the
hardships of tlie war. The Yankees were pleasantly entertained
with stories of our suffering. Their pictorials were adorned
with caricatures of " secesh " in skeleton soldiers and gaunt
cavalrymen with spurs strapped to their naked heels. Their
perfumed fops and dainty ladies had the fashion of tittering at
the rags of our prisoners. They had an overwhelming sense
of the ludicrous in the idea of Southern M'omen cutting up the
carpets in their houses to serve for blankets and garments for
the soldiers.

The fact was that our sufferings were great ; but their mute
eloquence, which the enemy misinterpreted as a prospect of
craven submission, was truly the sign of self-devotion. What-
ever was suffered in physical destitution was not to be regret-
ted. It practised our people in self-denial ; it purified their
gpirit ; it brought out troops of virtues; it ennobled our wo-'
men with offices of charity ; it gave us new bonds of sympathy
and love, and it trained us in those qualities which make a
nation great and truly independent.

In the whirl of jvassing events, many strange things were
daily happening around us that at a remoter period of history
will read like romance. The directions of our industry were
changed. Planters raised corn and potatoes, fattened hogs and
cultivated garden vegetables, while cotton was by universal
consent neglected. Our newspapers were of all sizes and
colors, sometimes containing four pages, sometimes two, and
not a few were printed on common brown wrapping paper,
-Politics were dead. A political enemy was a curiosity only
read of in the records of the past. Our amusements had been
revolutionized. Outside of Pichmond, a theatre was remem-
bered only as an institution of by-gone times. Most of our

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 185

people did their own playing and their own singing ; and the
ladies spent the mornings in sewing coarse shirts or pantaloons
for the soldiers to wear, and sung in public at night to gain
money for the soldiers' equipments.

The footprints of the enemy, in Yirginia especially, had
marked lines of desolation such as history seldom records.
Starting from Fortress Monroe and running westward to Win-
chester, scarcely a house within fifty miles of the Potomac but
bore evidence of Yankee greed and spoliation. In nearly
every county the court-house in which the assizes for each
county used to be held, was rudely demolished, doors and win-
dows torn down ; while within, upon the white walls in every
phase of handwriting, were recoi-ded the autographs of the
vandals, whose handiwork surrounded the beholder.

While the people of the South suffered, the resources of the
country were developed by harsh necessity ; and about the pe-
riod where our narrative reaches, we are called upon to notice
that happy change in the administration of our government, in
which short-sighted expectations of peace were replaced by
the policy of provision and an amassment of stores for a war
of indefinite duration. Measures were adopted to afford ade-
quate supplies of ordnance, arms, and munitions for the army.
Of small-arms the supply was more adequate to the regiments
of the army than at any other time. They had increased from
importation, and capture not less than eighty thousand. Es-
tablishments for making ordnance were founded in different
parts of the South ; a nitre corps was organized for service ;
and former dread of deficiency of the munitions of war no
longer existed. The manufacturing resources of the country,
especially in iron, were liberally patronized by the government,
by large advances and liberal contracts ; but in this the public
service met great embarrassment from the temptations con-
stantly offered to contractors to prefer the superior profits
which they could command by supplying the general market.
The quartermaster's department was under the direction of
Gen. Myers, of South Carolina, whose contributions to the cause
of the South, in the zeal and ability which he brought into his
important office, must take a high rank in all the histories of
the war. He contended against the. great obstacles of the
blockade, the difficulties of railroad transportation, and the

186 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

constant losses in the enemy's ravages of the country, and per-
formed wonders under the most unfavorable circumstances.
"Woollens and leather were imported from Europe through
trains of difficulties , the most devoted exertions were made to
replenish the scant supplies of blankets and shoes in the army ;
and by using to the utmost our internal resources, by the es-
tablishment of factories and the organization of workshops ;
and by greater economy in the use of our supplies, the suffer-
in o-s of our soldiers were alleviated and their zeal refreshed for
the campaign.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE. 187

CHAPTER YH.

The Heroism of Virginia. — Her Battle-fields. — Burnside's Plan of Campnign. —
Calculations of his Movement upon Fredericksburg. — Failure to surprise Gen. Lee. —
The Battle of Fbederioksbubo. — Tlie Enemy crossing the River. — Their Bombard-
ment of the Town. — Scenes of Distress. — The Battle on the Eight Wing. — Tlie Story
of Marye's Heights. — Repulse of the Enemy. — The old Lesson of barren Victory. —
Death of Gen. Cobb. — Death of Gen. Gregg. — Romance of the Story of Fredericks-
burg.— Her noble Women. — Yankee Sacking of the Town. — A Specimen of Yankee
Warfare in North Carolina. — Designs of the Enemy in this State. — The Engagements
of Kinston, — Glance at other Theatres of the War. — Gen. Hindman's Victory at Prai-
rie Grove. — Achievements of our Cavalry in the West. — The Affair of Hartsville. — Col.
Clarkson's Expedition. — Condition of Events at the Close of the Year 1862.

YiKGiNiA had borne the brunt of the war. Nearly two-
thirds of her territory had been overrun by the enemy, and
her richest fields had been drenched with blood or marked by
the scars of the invader. The patriotic spirit and the chival-
rous endurance of this ancient and admirable commonwealth
had not only supported these losses and afflictions without a
murmur, but these experiences of the war were the sources of
new inspiration, and the occasions of renewed resolution and
the reinforcement of courage by the sentiment of devotion.
When we add to the consideration of the grand spirit of this
State the circumstances that the flower of the Confederate
army was naturally collected on this the most critical theatre
of the war, and that the operations in Virginia were assisted
by the immediate presence of the government, we shall natu-
rally look here for the most brilliant and decisive successes of
the war.

When the Confederate army fell back into Virginia, after
its short but eventful campaign in Maryland, Gen. Lee, by the
skilful disposition of his forces in front of Winchester, ren-
dered it impracticable for McClellan to invade the Yalley of
the Shenandoah, and forced him to adopt the route on the east
side of the Blue Ridge, The Federal commander accepted
this alternative the more readily, since he hoped, by an osten-
tatious display of a part of his forces near Shepherdstown, to
deceive Gen, Lee and gain his flank and rear at Warrenton,

188 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

On his arrival at this latter place, however, much to his siir-
prise and dismay, he found the forces of Lee quietly awaiting
him on tlie south bank of the Kappahannock.

McCIellan having been superseded by Burnside, that officer
undertook a plan of campaign entirely on his own responsi-
bility, in opposition to tlie suggestions of Halleck and to what
•were known to be the predilections of the military authorities
at Washington, The plan of Gen. Burnside was to concentrate
the army in the neigliborhood of Warrenton, to make a small
movement across the Rappahannock as a feint, with a view to
divert the attention of the Confederates and lead them to be-
lieve he was going to move in the direction of Gordonsville,
and then to make a rapid movement of the whole army to
Fredericksburg, on the north side of the Rappahannock.

In moving upon Fredericksburg, Gen. Burnside calculated
that his army would all the time be as near Washington as
would the Confederates, and that after arriving at Fredericks-
burg it would be at a point nearer to Richmond than it would
be even if it should take Gordonsville.

This novel enterprise against the Confederate Capital was
hailed by the l^orthern newspapers with renewed acclamations
of " on to Richmond ;" and the brazen and familiar prophecy
of the fall of the city " within ten days" was repeated with
new emphasis and bravado. In the mean time the plans of
Burnside, so far as they contemplated a surprise of the Con-
federates, had failed, and at Fredericksburg, as at Warrenton,
his army found itself, by the active movements of Gen. Lee,
confronted by a force sufficient to dispute its advance and to
deliver battle on a scale commensurate with the stake.

THE BATTLE OF FREDERICKSBURG.

Gen. Burnside having concentrated his army at Fredericks-
burg, employed himself for several days in the latter part of
November in bringing up from Aquia Creek all the pontoons
he could for building the bridges which were necessary to
throw his forces across the river. Several councils of war were
called to decide about crossing the Rappahannock, It was
tinally determined to cross at Fredericksburg, under the im-
pression that Gen. Lee had thrown a large portion of his force

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE. 189

down the river and elsewhere, thus weakening his defences in
front.

On the night of the 10th of December the enemy comnienced
to throw three bridges over the Rappahannock — two at Fred-
ericksburg, and the third about a mile and a quarter below,
near the mouth of Deep Run. In the prosecution of this
work, the enemy was defended by his artillery on the hills of
Stafford, which completely commanded the plain on which
Fredericksburg stands. The narrowness of the Rappahannock,
its winding course, and deep bed, afforded opportunity for the
construction of bridges at points beyond the reach of our artil-
lery, and the banks had to be watched by skirmishers. The
houses of Fredericksburg afforded a cover for the skirmishers
at the bridges opposite the town, but at the lowest point of
crossing no shelter could be had.

The 17th Mississippi regiment, Barksdale's brigade, being on
picket within the town, were ordered to the bluff overlooking
the site of the old railroad bridge. The moon was brilljant,
and by its light our men could distinguish the enemy's forces
working on a pontoon bridge stretching from the Stafford bank
towards the foot of the bluff. In the course of an hour the
bridge had been stretched "wdthin sixty yards of the southern
shore. The work was going bravely on, when the two com-
panies of the 17th, who were lying on the extreme verge of the
bluff, were ordered to fire. The order was deliberately given
and executed. At the crack of our rifles, the bride-builders
scampered for the shore ; but the next moment there was
opened upon the bluff a terrific fire of shell, grape, and mus-
ketry, which was kept up until our troops retired. Twice again,
at intervals of half an hour, the enemy renewed the attempt
to complete the bridge, but was in each instance repulsed.
After the third repulse of the enemy, the whole of Barksdale's
brigade was ordered to the support of the 17th regiment, and
were put into position, some in the rear of the blufi' and others
higher up and lower down the stream. At this juncture the
enemy's fire from cannon and small-arms became so tremen-
dous and overwhelming, that our troops were only preserved
from destruction by lying flat on their faces. In every instance
in which a man ventured to raise his head from the earth, he
was instantly riddled by bullets or torn to pieces by grapeshot.

190 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

The emergency may be understood when it is borne in mind
that the position occupied by our men was swept by the enemy's
batteries and sharpshooters not two hundred yards distant on
the opposite heights.

Towards five o'clock in the afternoon of the 11th of Decem-
ber, three rousing cheers from the river bank beneath the bluff
announced that the enemy had completed the bridge, and that
his troops had effected a landing on the southern bank. About
this time the order for a retreat was received by our men.
The regiments of the brigade fell back by different streets,
firing as they retreated upon the enemy, who closely followed
them. The brigade rendezvoused at the market-house and
faced the enemy. A sharp skirmish ensued, but our troops,
acting under orders, again fell back and left the town in pos-
session of the enemy.

It having become evident to Gen. Lee that no effectual op-
position could be offered to the construction of the bridges or
passage of the river, it only remained that positions should be
selected to oppose the enemy's advance after crossing. Under
cover of the darkness of the night of the 12th and of a dense
fog, a large force passed the river, and took position on the
light bank, protected by their heavy guns on the left.

The effects of the enemy's bombardment upon the unfortu-
nate town were deplorable. The majority of the population
had long ago fled the city at the prospect of its destruction ;
and the touching spectacles of their misery and suffering were
seen for miles around the city, where houseless women and
children were camped out or roaming shelterless and hungry
through the fields. A number of citizens who had returned to
the town under the delusion that it would not be attacked, left
it during the day the enemy crossed the river, single or in
families, and sought for refuge and safety in the country.
They were scattered about — some in cabins, some in the open
air, and others wandering vacantly along the railroads. Little
children with blue feet trod painfully the frozen ground, and
those whom they followed knew as little as themselves where
to seek food and shelter. Hundreds of ladies wandered home-
less over the frozen highway, with bare feet and thin clothing,
knowing not where to find a place of refuge. Delicately nur-
tured girls, with slender forms, upon which nc rain had ever

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 191

beat, which no wind had ever visited too roughly, walked hur-
riedly, with unsteady feet, upon the road, seeking only some
place where they could shelter themselves. Whole families
sought sheds by the wayside, or made roofs of fence-rails and
straw, knowing not whither to fly, or to what friend to have
recourse. This was the result of the enemy's bombardment.
Night had settled down, and though the roar of the batteries
had hushed, the flames of burning houses still lit up the land-
scape.

The sun of the 13th of December rose clear, but a dim fog
shrouded the town of Fredericksburg and the circumjacent
valleys, and delayed the opening of the antagonistic batteries.
At two o'clock in the morning our troops were all under arms,
and batteries in position to receive the expected attack of the
enemy.

The Rappahannock, in its course from west to east, is skirted
just at the point where Fredericksburg stands on its southern
bank, by low crests of hills, which on the northern bank run
parallel and close to the river, and on the southern bank trend
backward from the stream, and leave a semicircular plain six
miles in length and two or three in depth, inclosed within their
circumference before they again approach the river in the
neighborhood of Massaponax creek. Immediately above the
town, and on the left of the Confederate position, the bluffs
are bold and bare of trees ; but south of the railroad, begin-
ning near the town and running to a point at Hamilton's cross-
ing, and also parallel with the river, is a range of hills covered
with dense oak forest, fringed on its northern border by pine
thickets. Our forces occupied the whole length of this forest.
Longstreet's corps occupied the highlands above, opposite and
for a mile below the town. Jackson's corps rested on Long-
street's right, and extended away to the eastward, the extreme
right, under A. P. Hill, crossing the railroad at Hamilton's
crossing, and stretching into the valley towards the river.
Our front was about six miles in length. Most of tne batteries
of both corps were posted in the skirts of the forest, along
the line of the railroad, the seven batteries in Col. Lindsey
"Walker's regiment and Stuart's horse artillery being stationed
in the valley, between the railroad at Hamilton's crossing and
the river. The enemy's forces occupied the valley north of

192 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAE.

the railroad from Fredericksburg to within half a mile of our
extreme right. His light batteiies were posted over the south-
ern extremity of the valley, at from a quarter of a mile to a
mile from the railroad, while the hills on the northern banks of
the river from Falmouth to Fitzhngh's farm, five miles below
Fredericksburg, were studded at intervals of half a mile with
his batteries of heavy guns.

At noon the fog had cleared away, but there was a thick
haze in the atmosphere. About this time the enemy's infantry
moved forward from the river towards our batteries on the
hills. As they pressed forward across the valley, Stuart's
horse artillery from our extreme right opened upon them a de-
structive enfilading fire of round-shot. This fire, which an-
noyed them sorely, was kept up in spite of six batteries which
were directed against the horse artillery as soon as it was un-
masked. By one o'clock the Yankee columns liad crossed the
valley and entered the woods south of the railroad. The bat-
teries on both sides slackened their fire, and musketry, at first
scattering, but quickly increasing to a crash and roar, sounded
through the woods. Dense volumes of smoke rose above the
trees, and volley succeeded volley, sometimes so rapidly as to
blend into a prolonged and continuous roar. A. P. Hill's di-
vision sustained the first shock of battle. The rest of Jack-
son's corps were in diff'erent lines of reserves. D. H. Hill's
division was drawn up in J. L. Marye's field, under a long hill,
in rear of our line of battle. Here they remained during the
most of the day, being moved from time to time to the right
or left, as the exigencies of battle dictated. Shortly after the
infantry fight began, a brigade of this division was moved at a
double-quick a mile and a half to the right, and posted in a
dense clump of pines, in supporting distance of Stuart's horse
artillery. In ten minutes they were brought back to their
original position. The celerity of this movement made a sin-
gular and exciting spectacle. A long black line shoots from
the position of the reserves, crosses the railroad at Hamilton's
station, skims across the valley, and in a few moments is lost
in the pines nearly two miles away. After scarcely a breath-
ing spell, the same line emerges from the pines and retraces
its steps to its original position. As this brigade resumed its
position in reserve, the fire of musketry directly in its front

THE SKCOND YEAK OF THE -WAR. 193

slackened. A few crackling shots were heard to our left,
along Longstreet's division, and then a succession of volleys,
which were kept up at intervals during the remainder of the
evening. The musketry lire on our right was soon renewed,
and the battle raged with increased fury. Our batteries along
our whole front again reopened, and Col. Walker's artillery
regiment, composed of Latham's^ Letcher's, Braxton's, Pe-
gram's, Crenshaw's, Johnson's and Mcintosh's batteries, sta-
tioned in the open low grounds, to the east of the railroad at
Hamilton's station, moved forward several hundred yards in
the direction of Fredericksburg. Hill's and Early's troops
had driven the enemy from the woods and across the railroad
in the direction of their pontoon bridges near Deep Run. Our
men pursued them a mile and a half across the bottom land,
and fell back only when they had gotten under the shelter of
their batteries. Again the enemy rallied and returned to re-
new the contest, but were again driven back. All the batteries
of Jackson's corps were at this time in full play, and in the
approaching twilight the blaze of the guns and the quick
flashes of the shells more distinctly visible, constituted a scene
at once splendid and terrific.

On the right wing the enemy had been driven back with
great loss. Gen. Stuart had well i-edeemed his grim dispatch —
that he was "going to crowd 'era with artillery." The enor-
mous strength of this military arm had been used with desper-
ation on one side and devoted courage on the other. The
enemy had twenty thousand men engaged on this wing, while,
altogether, from first to last, we had not more than ten thou-
sand in the line of fire.

But while the battle was dashing furiously against the lines
of Jackson, the enemy was crossing troops over his bridges at
Fredericksburg and massing them in front of Longstreet, in
the immediate neighborhood of the town.

On reference to the positions of the battle-field, it will be
apparent that the left of the Confederate army — a portion of it
stationed not more than four hundred yards from Fredericks-
burg— occupied a much stronger position than the centre and
right. There was not sufficient room for the Yankee troops
destined for the attack of the nearest Confederate batteries to
deploy and form, except under a deadly Confederate fire,

13

194 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

whereap, the Tankee troops wlio attacked the Confederate
centre and right, had a large phiin on which to deploy, and
had mnch fewer disadvantages of ground to contend with, in-
asmnch as they advanced against lower hills and had the long
spurs of copse to assist them as points of attack, calculated to
protect and serve as jpoints cPajrpui to the Yankees if they
could once have succeeded in carrying and holding them.

In this part of the field the enemy displayed a devotion that
is remarkable in history. Tiiis display does not adorn the
Yankees ; it was made by a race that has left testimonies of
its courage in such stories as Waterloo and Fontenoy. To the
Irish division, commanded by Gen. Meagher, was principally
committed the desperate task of bursting out of the town of
Fredericksburg, and forming under the withering fire of the
Confederate batteries, to attack Marye's Heights, towering
immediately in their front. The troops were harangued in
impassioned language by their commander, who pointed to the
heights as the contested prize of victory.

The heights Avere occupied by the Washington Artillery and
a portion of McLaws' division. As the enemy advanced, the
artillery reserved their fire until he arrived within two hundred
and fifty j-ards, when they opened on the heavy masses with
grape and canister. At the first broadside of the sixteen guns
of the battalion, hundreds of the enemy w^ent down, and at
every successive discharge, great furrows were plowed through
their ranks. They staggered repeatedly, but were as often
rallied and brought forward. Again and again they made
frantic dashes upon our steady line of fire, and as often were
the hill-sides strewn for acres with their corpses. At last, no
longer able to withstand the withering fire, they broke and fled
in confusion. They were pressed into town by our infantry.
Our victory was complete all along the line. When the voices
of our officers in the darkness ordered the last advance, the
combat had terminated in the silence of the foe.

The enemy left behind him a ghastly field. Some portions
of it were literally packed with his dead. At the foot ot
Marye's Heights w^as a frightful spectacle of carnage. The
bodies which had fallen in dense masses within forty yards
of the muzzles of Col. Walton's guns, testified to the gallantry

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 195

of the Irish division, and showed what manner of men they
wure who pressed on to death with the dauntlessness of a race
whose courage history has made indisputable. The loss of the
enemy was out of all comparison in numbers with our own ;
the evidences of its extent do not permit us to doubt that it
was at least ten thousand ; while our own killed and wounded,
during the operations since the movements of the enemy began
at Fredericksburg, amounted to about eighteen hundred.

At the thrilling tidings of Fredericksburg the hopes of the
South rose high that we were at last to realize some important
and practical consequences from the prowess of our arms. We
had obtained a victory in which the best troops of the ISTorth
— including Sumner's grand division — had been beaten ; in
which defeat had left the shattered foe cowering beneath the
houses of Fredericksburg; and in which he had been forced
into a position which left him no reasonable hope of escape,
with a river in his' rear, which, though threaded by pontoon
bridges, would have been impassable under the pressure of
attack. It is remarkable that, so far as the war had progress-
ed, although fought on an almost unparalleled scale in num-
bers, it was yet not illustrated by the event so common in the
military history of Europe, of the decisive annihilation of any
single arm}'". But it was thought that Fredericksburg, at least,
would give an illustration of a decisive victory in this war.
The Southern public waited with impatience for the comple-
tion of the success that had already been announced, and the
newspapers were eagerly scanned for the hoped-for intelligence
that Gen. Lee had, by the vigor of a fresh assault, dispatched
his crippled enemy on the banks of the river. But no such
assault was made. While the public watched with keen im-
patience for the blow, the announcement came that the enemy,
after having remained entirely at his leisure one day in Fred-
ericksburg, had the next night crossed the Bappahannock
without accident or a single effort at interruption on our part,
and that the army of Burnside, which Avas a short while ago
thought to be in the jaws of destruction, was quietly reorgan-
izing in perfect security on the north bank of the river. It
was the old lesson to the South of a barren victory. The story
of Fredericksburg was incomplete and unsatisfactory ; and

196 THE SECOND TEAE OF THE WAR.

there appeared no prospect but that a war waged at awful
sacrifices was yet indefinitely to linger in the trail of bloody
skirmishes.

The victory, which had only the negative advantage of hav-
ing checked the enemy without destroying him, and the vulgar
glory of our leaving killed and wounded several thousand men
more than we had lost, had been purchased by us with lives,
though comparatively small in numbers, yet infinitely more
precious than those of mercenary hordes arrayed against us.
Two of our brigadier-generals — Gen. Thomas R. R. Cobb of
Georgia and Gen. Maxcy Gregg of South Carolina — had fallen
on the field. The loss of each was more conspicuous from ex-
traordinary personal worth than from mere distinctions of
rank. Gen. Cobb was the brother of Gen. Howell Cobb, and
was an able and eloquent member of the Provisional Congress,
in which body he had served in the important capacity of
chairman of the committee on military affairs.

Of the virtues and services of Gen. Maxcy Gregg it is not
necessary to remind any portion of the people of the South
by a detailed review of incidents in his careei'. His name was
familiarly coupled with the first movements of the war, he
having been appointed to the command of the 1st South Caro-
lina reo-iment, the first force from the State which arrived in
Yirginia, and whose advent at Richmond had been hailed with
extraordinary demonstrations of honor and welcome. The term
of the service of this regiment having expired, it returned to
South Carolina, but its commander, Col. Gregg, remained in
Yirginia, and subsequently reorganized the regiment, which
had since been constantly and conspicuously in service. Its
commander was subsequently made a brigadier-general.

Gen. Gregg, although the occupations of his life were prin-
cipally professional, had a large and brilliant political reputa-
tion in his State. He was a leading member of the bar, and
practised his profession with distinction and success for a
period of more than twenty years in Columbia. In politics he
was an extreme State Rights man, and stood, with others, at
the head of that party in South Carolina. He took a promi-
nent part in favor of the policy of reopening the slave-trade,
which had been the subject of some excited and untimely dis-
cussion in the South some years ago ; he and ex-Governor

LT GEN. LONGSTREET,

From a Phaiagrapk taken from liTl

lagrai/f-d for lie Secoiia-Teai of the War.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 19T

Adams, of South Carolina, being associated as tlie leading
representatives of that idea in the cotton States.

Gen. Gregg was remarkable for his firm and unflinching
temper. In the armj he had an extraordinary reputation for
self-possession and sang froid in battle. He was never discon-
certed, and had the happy faculty of insi^iring the courage of
his troops, not so much by words as by his cool determination
and even behavior.

The romance of the story of Fredericl^sburg is written no
less in the quiet heroism of her women than in deeds of arms.
The verses of the poet rather than the cold language of a mere
chronicle of events are most fitting to describe the beautiful
courage and noble sacrifices of those brave daughters of Vir-
ginia, who preferred to see their homes reduced to ashes,-
rather than polluted by the Yankee, and who in the blasts of
winter, and in the fiercer storms of blood and fire, went forth
undismayed, encouraging our soldiers, and proclaiming their
desire to suffer privation, poverty, and death, rather than the
shame of a surrender or the misfortune of a defeat. In all
the terrible scenes of Fredericksburg, there were no weakness
and tears of women. Mothers, exiles from their homes, met
their sons in the ranks, embraced them, told them their duty,
and with a self-negation most touching to witness, concealed
their want, sometimes their hunger, telling their brave boys
they were comfortable and happy, that they might not be
troubled with domestic anxieties. At Hamilton's crossing,
many of the women had the opportunity of meeting their rela-
tives in the army. In the haste of flight, mothers had brought
a few garments, or perhaps the last loaf of bread for the sol-
dier boy, and the lesson of duty whispered in the ear gave to
the young heart the pure and brave inspiration to sustain it iu
battle. No more touching and noble evidence could be oflered
of the heroism of the women of Fredericksburg than the grati-
tude of our army ; for, afterwards, when subscriptions for their
relief came to be added up, it was found that thousands of
dollars had been contributed by ragged soldiers out of their
pittance of pay to the fund of the refugees. There could be
no more eloquent tribute than this ofi'ered to the women of
Fredericksburo; — a beautiful and immortal souvenir of their
sufi'ermgs and virtues.

108 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAE.

AVluit was endured in the Yankee saeking of the town, finds
scarcely anywhere a parallel in the liistory of civilized races.
It is impossible to detail here the murderous acts of the
enemy, the arsons, the robberies, the torture of women, and
the innumerable and indescribable villanies committed upon
lielpless people. The following extract from the New York
Tribune, written by one of its army correspondents in a tone
of devilish amusement, affords a glimpse of Burnside's brig-
ands in Fredericksburg, and of the accustomed barbarities of
the enemy :

"The old mansion of Douglas Gordon — perhaps the wealth-
iest citizen in the vicinity — is now used as the headquarters of
General Howard, but before he occupied it, every room had
been torn with shot, and then all the elegant furniture and
works of art broken and smashed by the soldiers, who burst
into the house after having driven the rebel sharpshooters from
behind it. "When I entered it early this morning, before its
occupation by Gen. Howard, I found the soldiers of his fine
division diverting themselves wnth the rich dresses found in
the wardrobes ; some; had on bonnets of the fashion of last
year, and were surveying themselves before mirrors, which, an
hour or two afterwards, were pitched out of the window and
smashed to pieces upon the pavement; others had elegant
scarfs bound round their heads in the form of turbans, and
shawls around their waists.

" We destroyed by fire nearly two whole squares of build-
ings, chiefly used for business purposes, together with the fine
residences of O. McDowell, Dr. Smith, J. PI. Kelly, A. S.
Cott, William Slaughter, and many other smaller dwellings.
Every store, I think, without exception, was pillaged of every
valuable article. A fine drug-store, which would not have
looked badly on Broadway, was literally one mass of broken
glass and jars."

The records of the Spanish and Moorish struggles, the wars
of the Roses, and the thirty years' war in Germany, may be
safely challenged for comparisons with the acts of barbarity
of the Yankees. Their worst acts of atrocity were not com-
mitted in the mad intoxication of combat, but in cold and
cowardly blood on the helpless and defenceless. While the
lawless and savage scenes in Fredericksburg, to which we

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 199

iiave 1 eferred, were still fresli in the public mind, the enemy in
another department of the war, was displaying the same fiend-
ish temper, stung by defeat and emboldened with the prospect
of revengiyg his fortunes on the women and children of the
South. The Yankee incursions and raids in North Carolina
in the month of December are companion pieces to the sack of
Fredericksburg.

" On entering Williamstown, North Carolina," says an eye-
witness, " the Yankees respected not a single house — it mat-
tered not whether the owner was in or absent. Doors were
broken open and houses entered by the soldiers, who took
every thing they saw, and what they were unable to carry
away they broke and destroyed. Furniture of every descrip-
tion was committed to tlie flames, and the citizens who dared
to remonstrate with them were threatened, cursed, and buffeted

about The enemy stopped for the night at Mr.

Ward's mill. Mr. AVard was completely stripped of every
thing, they not even leaving him enough for breakfast. While
on a sick-bed, his wife was, in his presence, searched and rob-
bed of, five hundred dollars. The Yankees went about fifteen
miles above Hamilton, wdien, for some cause, they suddenly
turned and marched back, taking, with some slight deviations
in quest of plunder, the same route they had come. The town
of Hamilton was set on fire and as many as fifteen houses laid
in ashes. During the time the Yankees encamped at Wil-
liamstown every thing which they left unharmed when last
there was demolished. Every house in town was occupied
and defaced. Several fine residences were actually used as
horse-stables. Iron safes were broken open, and in the pres-
ence of their owners rifled of their contents. Several citi-
zens were seized and robbed of the money on their persons.
. . , . On Sunday morning Williamstown was fired, and
no effort made to arrest the flames until several houses were
burnt. No attempt was made by the Yankee ofticers, from
Gen. Foster down, to prevent the destruction of property. On
the contrary, they connived at it, and some of the privates did
not hesitate to say that they were instructed to do as they had
done. Two ladies at Williamstown went to Gen. Foster to be-
seech protection from his soldiers, and were rudely and arro-
gantly ordered from his presence."

200 THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAK.

Referring to the same scenes, a correspondent writes : " Fam
ilies who fled in dismay at the approach of the invader, re-
turned and foimd, as well as the few who remained at home,
clothes, beds, bedding, spoons, and books abstracted ; costly
furniture, crockery, doors, harness, af»d vehicles demolished ;
locks, windows, and mirrors broken ; fences burned ; corn, po-
tatoes, and peas gathered from the barns and fields consumed;
iron safes dug to pieces and thrown out of doors, and their con-
tents stolen."

The object of the enemy's movements in ^N^orth Carolina,
long a subject of anxious speculation, was at last developed, in
time for a severe check to be given it. At the time that the
enemy assaulted our lines in front of Fredericksburg, following
his favorite policy of simultaneous attack in different depart-
ments, he had planned a movement upon the Wilmington and
"Weldon railroad ; and on the same day that the battle of Fred-
ericksburg was fought, occurred an important passage of arms
in North Carolina.

On the 13th of December, Brigadier-gen. Evans encoun-
tered, with two thousand men, the advancing enemy, and with
this small force held him in check at Southwest creek, beyond
Kinston. The Yankee force, commanded by Foster, consisted
of fifteen thousand men and nine gunboats. Having delayed
their advance for some time, Gen. Evans succeeded in with-
drawing his force, with small loss, to the left bank of the Neuse
river at Kinston. He held the Yankees at bay until the 16th,
when they advanced on the opposite side of the river, and
made an attack at Whitehall bridge, about eighteen miles
below Goldsboro' ; in which they were driven back by Gen.
Robertson, with severe loss. i

The important object on our side was to protect the railroad
bridge over the Neuse, and the county bridge about half a
inile above; and to eflfect this, i-einforcements having reached
ns, a rapid disposition of our forces was made. During the
17th, the enemy appeared in force before Gen. Clingman's three
regiments, and he withdrew, across the county bridge, to this
side of the river. The artillery of the enemy was playing upon
the railroad bridge ; and Evans' brigade had at last to move
forward by the county road, and cross, if at all, the bridge a
half mile above the railroad. About two o'clock in the after-

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAE. 201

noon one bold and daring incendiary succeeded in reaching the
bridge, and covered by the wing wall of the abutment, lighted
a flame which soon destroyed the superstructure, leaving the
masonry, abutments, and pier intact.

It was very important for us now to save the county bridge,
the only means remaining of crossing the river in the vicinity.
Evans' and Clingman's brigades were ordered to cross, sup-
ported by Pettigrew's brigade ; and the Mississipi^i brigade,
just coming in, was ordered to move forward at once. The
enemy were driven back from their position on the line of the
railroad, but on account of the lateness of the hour, the nature
of the ground, and the fact -that our artillery, cavalry, and a
large portion of the reinforcements had not yet arrived, it was
not deemed advisable to attack their strong second position that
evening. During the night the enemy made a hurried retreat
to their fortifications and gunboats, moving with such celerity
that it was useless to attempt pursuit with any other arms than
cavalry, of which, at that time, unfortunately, we had none.

Our loss in these engagements was inconsiderable — seventy-
one killed and two hundred and sixty-eight w^ounded. The
enemy's occupation of Kinston, and the bridge there, pre-
vented a body of our men, about five hundred in number, from
escaping. The greater part were taken prisoners and paroled,
and some few succeeded in escaping higher up on the river.

The substantial achievements of the grand army of invasion
were, that they burned the superstructure of two bridges, which
cost originally less than ten thousand dollars. They had ut-
terly failed to attempt to take advantage of the temporary
and partial interruption of our railroad line, for the purpose
of striking a decisive blow at any important point before we
could thoroughly re-establish our communication without it.

In other quarters of the war less important than Virginia or
North Carolina, the early months of the winter were distin-
guished by some combats of various importance. The feeble
campaign in the country west of the Mississippi was marked
by one engagement, the dimensions of which were large for
that campaign, but the situation of which was too distant to
affect the general condition of the Confederacy.

On the 27th of November, Gen. Ilindinan came up with the
enemy at Prairie Grove, near Fayetteville, Arkansas, with a

202 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

force of about nine thousand men. The enemj, under the
command of Gen. Blount, was ah*eady largely superior in
numbers; and it was the object of Hindman to cut off rein-
forcements of seven or eight thousand, which were on the
march. In this he failed ; but, nothing daunted, brought on
the attack at daylight, capturing, in the first charge of Gen.
Marmaduke's cavalry, a whole regiment, and twenty-three
wagons heavily laden with quartermaster and medical stores.
Soon after sunrise the fight commenced in good earnest, and
with no cessation the artillery continued until nightfall. Our
"whole line of infantry were in close conflict nearly the whole
day with the enemy, wdio were attempting, with their force of
eighteen thousand men, to drive us from our position. In every
instance they were repulsed, and finally driven back from the
field ; Gen. Hindman driving them to within eight miles of
Fayetteville, when our forces fell back to their supply depot,
between Cane Hill and Yan Buren. We captured three hun-
dred prisoners and vast quantities of stores. The enemy's loss
in killed and wounded was about one thousand; the Confeder-
ate loss, in killed, wounded, and missing, about three hundred.
In one of the charges of the engagement. Gen. Stein, of the
Missouri State Guard, was killed, a ball passing directly through
his brain.

The close of the year 1S62 leaves little to record of events of
importance sufficient to affect the fortunes of the war, beyond
what has been related in these pages with more or less par-
ticularity of detail. In that large expanse of country between
the Mississippi and the tributaries of the Atlantic, events, since
our last reference to these theatres of the war, were of little ap-
parent importance, although they were preparing for a grand
tragedy of arms upon which we shall find that the first page
of the new year opens. There were daring forays, brilliant
skirmishes and enterprises of our cavalry, to which a brief
reference is only possible in these pages. Snch were the ex-
ploits of Generals Forrest and Morgan, our distinguished cav-
alry commanders in West Tennessee, in which they annoyed
the enemy, destroyed railroad bridges and Federal property,
and captured several towns in successful raids. On the 7th of
December a single expedition, sent out under Morgan from
Geii. Bragg's lines, attacked an outpost of the enemy at Harts-

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR. 203

ville, on the Cumberland, killed and wounded two hundred,
captured eighteen hundred prisoners, two pieces of artillery^
and two thousand small-arms, and all other stores at the po-
sition. Nor in our slight record of indecisive but gallant
incidents of the war, must we neglect to mention the brave
enterprise of Col. Clarkson, another choice spirit of Southern
chivalry, who, with a detachment of the Yirginia State line,
penetrated into Kentucky, captured the town of Piketon on
the 8th of December, secured a large amount of stores, and
nipped an important enterprise of the enemy in the bud.

In the mean time some important new assignments of mili-
tary command had been made in preparation for the winter
campaign, and happily inspired the country with renewed
confidence in the fortunes of the war. Gen. Gustavus W. Smith,
whose patriotism was as enthusiastic as his military genius was
admirable (for he had broken ties as well as restraints in es-
caping from the North to join the standard of his native
South), had taken command in North Carolina. Gen. Beau-
regard had been assigned to the important care of the defences
of Charleston and Savannah, threatened by the most formida-
ble armadas that the warlike ingenuity and lavish expenditure
of the enemy had yet produced. Gen. Pemberton had relieved
Yan Dorn of the army of the Southwest at Holly Springs,
which had been taken by surprise on the 20th of December,
and was now in our possession ; and that latter officer, ill-
starred by fortune, but whose gallantry and enterprise were
freely acknowledged, was appropriately appointed to take
command of the cavalry forces in the West. The command
of all the forces between the Alleghany and the Mississippi
was intrusted to Gen. Joseph E. Johnston, whose matchless
strategy had more than once enlightened the records of the
war, and whose appointment to this large and important com-
mand was hailed with an outburst of joy and enthusiastic confi-
dence in all parts of the South.

204 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK.

CHAPTER VIII.

Tho eastern Portion of Tennessee. — Its Military Importance. — Composition of
Bragg's Army. — The Battle of Murfreesboko'. — The Kiglit Wing of the Enemy
routed.— Brngg's E.xultations. — The Assault of the 2d of January. — " The bloody
crossing of Stone Kiver." — The Confederates fall back to TiiUahoma. — Review of the
Battle-field of Murfreesboro'. — Repulse of the Enemy at Vicksburg.— The Recap-
TURK OF Galveston. — The Midnight March. — Capture of the " Harriet Lane." —
Arkansas Post taken by the Yankees. — Its Advantages. — The affair of the Rams in
Charleston Harbor. — Naval structure of the Confederacy. — Capture of the Yankee
gunboat " Queen of the West." — Heroism of George Wood. — Capture of the " In-
dianola."— The War on the Water. — The Confederate Cruisers. — Prowess of the
" Alabama."

The eastern portion of Tennessee abounds in hills, rocks,
poverty, and ignorance. But its military situation was one of
great importance to the Confederacy. The enemy already
held West and Middle Tennessee. It required but to occupy
East Tennessee to have entire possession of one of the most
valuable States of the Confederacy. They also felt bound in
honor and duty to render the long-promised assistance to the
Unionists of East Tennessee. Tennessee would be more
thoroughly theirs than Kentucky, when once they filled this
eastern portion of it with their armies. The essential geo-
graphical importance of this country to the Confederacy was
too obvious to be dwelt upon. It covered Georgia and involved
the defences of the cotton region of the South. Through it ran
a great continental line of railroad, of which the South could
not be deprived without unspeakable' detriment. The impor-
tance of this road to the supply of our armies was no less con-
siderable than to the supply of our general population.

The gallant and heroic army of the Confederacy, commanded
by Gen. Braxton Bragg, composed of Floridians, Louisianians,
South Carolinians, Georgians, and Kentuckians, numbering be-
tween thirty and forty thousand men, had occupied Murfrees-
boro' for over a month, in confidence and security, never
dreaming of the advance of the enemy. President Davis had
visited and reviewed the brave veterans of Fishing creek,

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 205

Pensacola, Donelson, Shiloh, Perrjville, and Ilartsville, and,
satisfied of their ability to resist any foe who should have the
temerity to attack them, he withdrew from our forces Steven-
son's division, of Earby Smith's corps, numbering about eight
thousand men, leaving scarcely thirty thousand men to defend
what was left to us of Tennessee.

Balls, parties, and brilliant festivities relieved the ennui of
the camp of the Confederates. On Christmas eve scenes of
revelry enlivened Murfreesboro', and officers and men alike
gave themselves up to the eujoym-ent of the hour, with an
abandonment of all military cares, indulging in fancied se-
curity.

The enemy's force at Nashville, under command of Rose-
crans, was not believed to have been over forty thousand, and
the opinion was confidently entertained that he would not
attempt to advance until the Cumberland should rise, to f^lford
him the aid of his gunboats. Indeed, Morgan had been sent
to Kentucky to destroy the Nashville road and cut off his
supplies, so that he might force the enemy to come out and
meet us. Yet, that very night, when festivity prevailed, the
enemy was marching upon us !

THE BATTLE OF MUKFKEESBORO'.

The grounds in front of Murfreesboro' had been surveyed
and examined a month before, in order to select a position for
battle in case of surprise, and our troops were thrown forward
to prevent such a misfortune. Polk's corps, with Cheatham's
division, occupied our centre, Maney's brigade being thrown
forward towards Lavergne, where Wheeler's cavalry was annoy-
ing the enemy. A portion of Kirby Smith's corps, McCown's
division, occupied Keadyville on our right, and Hardee's corps
occupied Triune on our left, with Wharton's cavalry thrown
out in the vicinity of Franklin.

Festival and mirth continued on Christmas day, but the day
following, Friday, the 26th, was a most gloomy one. The rain
fell in torrents. That same evening couriers arrived and
reported a general advance of the enemy. All was excitement
and commotion, and the greatest activity prevailed. The
enemy had already driven in our advance front. Hardee's

206 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

corps fell back from Triune. Major-gen. McCown's division
was ordered to march to Mnrfreesboro' at once, having received
the order at midnight. Heavy skirmishing b}'' AVlieeler and
"Wharton's cavahy had continued since the 25th. On the 27th
the ground for our line of battle was selected in front of the
town, about a mile and a half distant on Stone's river. The
enemy had now advanced beyond Triune, his main body
occuj)ying Stuart's creek, ten miles from town. On the 28tli
our troops took up their position in line of battle. Polk's
corps, consisting of "Withers' and Cheatham's divisions, formed
our left wing, and was posted about a mile and a half on the
west side of Stone's river, its right resting on the Nashville
road, and its left extending as far as the Salem pike, a distance
of nearly six miles. Hardee's corps, consisting of Breckin-
ridge's and Cleburne's divisions, was formed on the east bank
of the river, its left resting near the Nashville road, and its
right extending towards the Lebanon pike, about three miles
in length, making our line of battle about nine miles in length,
in the shape of an obtuse angle. McCown's division formed
the reserve, opposite our centre, and Jackson's brigade was
held in reserve on the right flank of Hardee. Stone's river
crosses the Salem pike about a mile and a half on the south
side of the town, making a curve below the pike about a mile
further south, and then runs nearly north and south in front
of Mnrfreesboro', crossing the Nashville pike and extending
towai-ds the Lebanon pike, some half a mile, when it makes
another turn or bend and runs nearly east and west, emptying
into the Cumberland river. The river, at the shoals, where
it crosses the Nashville pike, was fordable, and not over ankle
deep. The banks above and below were rather steep, being
some five to eight feet high, with rocky protrusions. The
nature of the country was undulating, buf mostly level in our
front, with large, open fields. To the right or the west side
the ground was more rolling, with rocky upheaval and crop-
pings of limestone and thick cedar groves. On the side of the
river towards the Lebanon pike were thin patches of woods
and rocky projections.

On the 29th there was continued skirmishing by our cavalry
forces, the enemy gradually advancing. On the 30th the
enemy had advanced by three columns and took up his posi-

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 207

tion about a mile in our front. At noon he shelled our
right and centre, in order to feel our reserves. At 3 p. m.
the enemy made an advance on our left, and attempted to
drive us back in order to occupv the o-round for his risrht wins:.
A spirited engagement immediately commenced, Gen. Polk
having ordered forward a portion of Withers' division. Robin-
son's battery held the enemj^ in check, keeping up a most
deadly and destructive fire. Three times the enemy charged
this battery, but were repulsed by the gallant one hundred and
fifty-fourth Tennessee. Col. Loomis, commanding Gardner's
brigade, and the brigade formerly Duncan's, with the South
Carolinians, Alabamians, and Louisianians, were most hotly
engaged, and though sufi'ering considerably, succeeded in dri-
ving back the enemy with great slaughter. It was now clear
that the enemy intended to mass his forces on our left, in order
to make a flank movement the next day, and obtain, if possible,
the Salem pike, which, if successful, would give him possession
of the Chattanooga railroad. Cleburne's division, of Hardee's
corps, and Major-gen. McCown's division, were immediately
ordered over towards the Salem pike to reinforce our extreme
left wing. Wheeler's cavalry had already gained the enemy's
rear, and had captured a train of wagons and a number of
prisoners. A cold, drizzling rain had set in, and our troops
were greatly exposed, being without shelter, and bivouacking
by their camp fires.

On the morning of the 31st, the grand battle was opened.
At the break of day on the cold and cloudy morning, Gen,
Hardee gave the order to advance, and the fight was opened
by McCown's division, with Cleburne, advancing upon the
enemy's right wing under Gen. McCook. The charge was of
the most rapid character. The alarm given by the enemy's
pickets scarcely reached his camp before the Confederates
were upon it. The sight of our advance was a most magnifi-
cent one. Two columns deep, with a front of nearly three-
fourths of a mile, the line well preserved and advancing with
great rapidity, on came the Confederate left wing, the bayo-
nets glistening in a bright sun, which had broken through the
thick fog.

The enemy was taken completely by surprise, their artillery
horses not even being hitched up. Such was the impetuosity

208 THE SECOND YKAK OF THE WAR.

of the charge, that the enemy fell back in disn.aj, our troops
pouring in a most murderous fire. "With such rapidity did our
men cross the broken ploughed fields, that our artillery could
not follow them. Wharton's cavalry had charged a battery,
the horses not being harnessed, and driving back the infantry
supporting it, succeeded in capturing it. The enemy having
gradually recovered, now disputed our further advance, and
the battle raged with terrific violence. They continued, to fall
back, however, under our fire, until we had swung round nearly
our whole left on their right, as if on a pivot, driving the en-
emy some six miles towards his centre, when "Withers and
Cheatham also hurled their divisions on the foe with such ter-
rible efi'ect, that battery after battery was taken, and their
dead lay in heaps upon the field. The enemy was now driven
towards the Nashville road, about a mile in front of our centre,
and took a commanding position on an eminence overlooking
the plain, and which was protected by rocks and a dense cedar
wood.

The battle had been terrific ; crash upon crash of musketry
stunned the ear; the ground trembled with the thunder of ar-
tillery ; tlie cedars rocked and quivered in the fiery blast, and
the air was rent with the explosion of shells. The enemy at
several points offered a most gallant resistance, but nothing
human could withstand the impetuosity of that charge. A
spirit of fury seemed to possess our men, from the command-
ers down to the common soldiers, and on they swept, shot and
shell, canister, grape, and bullets tearing through their ranks,
until the way could be traced by the dead and dying. Still on
they went, overturning infantry and artillery alike, driving the
enemy like the hurricane scatters the leaves upon its course,
capturing hundreds of prisoners, and literally blackening the
ground with the dead. Such a charge was never before wit-
nessed. For miles, through fields and forests, over ditches,
fences, and ravines, they swept. Brigade after brigade, bat-
tery after battery, were thrown forward to stay their onward
march ; but another volley of musketry, another gleaming of
the bayonet, and like their predecessors they were crushed into
one common ruin.

It was now about noon. Our charge had been one of splen-
did results. "We had already captured some five thousand

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 20&

prisoners, nearly thirty pieces of cannon, some ^ve thousand
stand of arms, and ammunition wagons. We had broken the
enemy's right, having driven him for nearly five hours on a
curve, a distance of over five miles from our extreme left to
the enemy's centre, and backwards about three miles from our
centre. The Yankees had made a stand only where the natu-
ral advantages of the ground sheltered them.

Hosecrans had not been dismayed by the events of the morn-
ing, and had watched them with an air of confidence which his
subordinate ofiicers found it difficult to understand. Referring
to his advei'sary, he said : " I'll show him a trick worth two of
his." Gen. Rosecrans was well aware of the danger of advan-
cing reinforcements from his left or centre. The Confederates
lay in his front, within sight and almost within hearing. He
knew that they were anxiously watching his movements, and
waiting to see which part of his line would be weakened. But
though he declined to send McCook reinforcements, Rosecrans
employed himself in so preparing his line as to aid McCook to
get safely on his right. His preparations were to halt the Corr
federates on his defeated right without exposing his left and
centre to imminent danger. For this purpose he quickly de-
termined to mass his artillery on the position occupied by the
centre. These movements were masked by immense cedar
forests. Thus prepared, at the proper moment the centre of
the enemy was advanced a few hundred yards, and soon after
the Confederates aj)peared in force pursuing his right wing.

The position of the enemy was on an oval-shaped hill not
very high, but furnishing an excellent position for his artillery.
It was determined to carry this stronghold at all hazards, and
the brigades of Chalmer and Donelson, supported by Mauley's
and Stewart's brigades, with Cobb's, Byrne's, Chas. Smitli's,
and Slocomb's batteries, were ordered to prepare for the
charge. It was a forlorn hope, but our men faced the mighty
whirlwind of shot and shell with heroic firmness, and did not
fall back till they had captured two batteries. The brigades
of Generals Adams and Jackson, of Breckinridge's division,
who held our right, were now ordered across the river to re-
lieve our broken columns, and advanced towards the enemy's
grand battery with a like coolness and heroism, but they were
also repulsed and fell back under the enemy's terrible fire.

11

210 THE SECOND YEAR OF TUE "WAK.

A portion of Gen. Hardee's command bivouacked for the
night in the cedars, within five hundred yards of the enemy's
lines. That night it was cold to freezing. Upon tlie battle-
field lay thousands of the enemy's dead and wounded, who
froze stifi*, presenting a ghastly scene by moonlight.

The scene in the cedars was fearful and picturesque. A
brilliant winter moon shed its lustre amid the foliage of the
forest of evergreens, and lighted up with silver sheen the
ghastly battle-field. Dismounted cannon, scattered caissons,
glittering and abandoned arms strewed the forest and field.
The dead lay stark and stifl' at every step, with clenched hands
and contracted limbs in the wild attitudes in which they fell,
congealed by the bitter cold. It was the eve of the new year.
Moans of the neglected dying, mingled with the low peculiar
shriek of the wounded artillery horses, chanted a miserere for
the dying year.

Amid the dim camp-fires, feebly lighted to avoid attracting
the artillery of the enemy, groups of mutilated and shudder-
ing wounded were huddled, and the kneeling forms of surgeons
bending in the firelight over the mangled bodies of the dying,
added to the solemnity of the night.

The appearance of the dead on the field was remarkable, for
the large proportion was evidently slain by artillery. The
bodies of many of the Confederates who had advanced to the
assault on the enemy's masked batteries were literally torn to
pieces. The cross-fire of the artillery had had this terrible
effect. " I saw," says a spectator of this terrible seen, " an
officer, whose two legs, one arm, and body lay in separate parts
of the field. I saw another whoso dislocated right arm lay
across his neck, and more than half his head was gone."

On the day succeeding the fight. Gen. Bragg telegraphed to
Hichmond the news of a great victory, presented his compli-
ments to the authoiities, and wrote '' God has granted us a
happy new year." His exultations were over hasty, for though
we had routed on the morning of the preceding day the right
wing of .the enemy, the final contest was yet to be decided.

In the mean time, Rosecrans fearing that his position might
bo flanked, or from some suspicion that it was not secure,
abandoned it that night, only to take up a still stronger one
in the bend of the ri>v.er, towards the Lebanon pike, on a couple

T»E SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 211

of hillocks, which he again crowned with his strongest bat-
teries.

Many of his generals felt despondent ; some favored retreat ;
but the constancy of Kosecrans remained nntouched. One of
his staff-officers remarked, "Your tenacity of purpose, general,
is a theme of universal comment." " I guess," he replied,^
" that the troops have discovered that Bragg is a good dog,
but hold-fast is better."

The first of the j^ear found the enemy strongly intrenched,
Avith his right drawn up a little on the south side of the Nash-
ville pike, while his left remained fortified in the bend of the
river, already described. Our position was greatly advanced
on the left and centre, but otherwise remained the same. On
that day Gen. Bragg issued the following address to his army :

" The general commanding is happy to announce to the
troops the continued success of our arms yesterday. Generals
Wheeler and Wharton, with the cavalry, again assaulted the
enemy's line of communication, capturing over two hundred
wagons and other stores. Twice have we now made the cir-
cuit of the enemy's forces, and destroyed his trains, and not
less than six hundred wagons, and three thousand mules have

fallen into our hands Our success continues

uninterrupted. One more struggle, and the glorious victory
already achieved will be crowned by the rout of the enemy,
who are now greatly demoralized. The general commanding
has every confidence that his gallant troops will fully meet his
expectations."

It was confidently believed that the enemy would retreat
on the night of the 31st, but as he did not, it was concluded
to wait and see if he would make any attack. The day conse-
quently passed off quietly, excepting some slight skirmishing.

On the 2d of January, the ill-omened Friday, the attitude
of the two armies remained the same during the morning, and
without incident, except some shelling on our right.

By three o'clock it was determined to assault the enemy's
stronghold on the bend of the river. It was a desperate de-
termination. Unfortunately, Gen. Bragg had given the enemy
nearly two days to reorganize and (concentrate his baffled
army, so that he might the more eff'ectually make a stubborn
resistance.

212 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAlJ.

The enemy had taken up a position at a point near the bend
of the river where it takes a westerly course. Here rises a
high ridge covered by a skirt of woods, on which the enemy
had planted their artillery, supported by a line of infantry.
Behind this ridge, and in the woods and rock}'- ravines, lay
concealed also a large force of the enemy. Further to the
enemy's left was another skirt of woods, which the enemy also
occupied, out-flanking our front nearly one thousand 3'ards.
Near the first skirt of woods mentioned is a ford of the river,
the opposite banks of which, from its elevated position, over-
looks and commands the ridge above described on this side, or
the south and east bank of the river, while one mile further
down the river is another ford. It was at this commanding
position in the river bend where the enemy had made his cita-
del, having massed his batteries of artillery and infantry in
such a skilful manner as to protect his centre on the Nashville
pike, and his extreme left, which now extended on our side of
the river. Such was the jDOsition of the enemy on our extreme
right on the morning of that memorable day of slaughter, the
2d of January.

Gen. Breckinridge was ordered to carry, by assault, the po-
sition of the enemy on the ridge already described. He form-
ed his division in two lines, changing front from his former
position to nearly a right angle, and facing in the direction of
the river. Gen. Hanson's brigade, with Palmer's, now com-
manded by Gen. Pillow, formed the first line, with Pillow on
the right ; the second line being formed by Preston's and Gib-
son's, two hundred yards in the rear. Col. Hunt's regiment,
of Hanson's brigade, was left to support Cobb's battery on the
hill. From the enemy's commanding position across the river,
he was enabled to see all of our movements, and consequently
prepared to resist us. Between Gen. Breckinridge's division
and the enemy's batteries on the ridge was an intervening space
of eight hundred yards, extending over an open field skirted
by woods, along which the enemy's skirmishers were in such
force as almost am-ounted to a line of battle.

The attack was to be made at four o'clock, and a signal gun
was to announce the hour. In those battalions stood the noble
soldiers of Florida, Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Tennessee,
and North Carolina in battle array, firm and inflexible, await-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 213

ini:; the signal for combat. The report of a cannon had not
died upon the ear before the bugle from Hanson's brigade
sounded a charge. The brigades moved rapidly forward
through the thinned woods until gaining the open fields, the
men having been instructed not to deliver their fire until close
upon the eneni}'^, and then to charge with the bayonet. On
came Pillow, followed by Preston ; forward hurried Hanson,
followed by Gibson. From the moment of gaining the field
the enemy's artillery from the ridge opened a sweeping fire,
and a whirlwind of Minnie balls from their infantry, with shot
and shell, filled the air. Our men were ordered to lie down
for a few minutes to let the fury of the storm pass. Then the
cry from Breckinridge — " Up, my men, and charge !" — rang
out. With the impetuosity of a torrent they rushed forward
to the woods sloping the ridge. On dashed Wright's battery
of Preston's brigade at a furious gallop, and soon opened fire
upon one of the enemy's batteries about three hundred yards
to our right. The enemy, awed by the mad bravery of our
men, recoiled ; their ranks thinned rapidly, notwithstanding
they received reinforcement after reinforcement, ^heir lefc
wing, which already out-flanked us on our right, was driven
back towards the river bank, the 20th Tennessee capturing
some two hundred prisoners. The contest now raged fierce
and bloody. It was one continuous roar of musketry and artil-
lery. Facing the storm of death, our heroes charged with
fury, and so efi'ective was the firing of our lines, that we car-
ried the I'idge with a wild demoniac yell, driving the enemy
from it, with his artillery, down the hill-side and across the
river. Capt. Wright soon reached the top of the ridge with
his battery, and opened on the enemy with spherical case. At
this time the concentrated fire of the enemy became terrible
and appalling. A sheet of flame was poured forth from their
artillery on the hills on the opposite side of the river overlook-
ing our left and front, and from their batteries on the river
bank, while the opposite side also swarmed with their infantr\%
who poured in on us a most murderous fire. Still our men
never quailed, but pressed forward and crossed the river, the
enemy making frightful gaps in our ranks, but which were
immediately closed up. Here it was that in less than half an
hour over two thousand of our brave soldiers went down ! The

214 THE SECOND TKAR OF THE WAR.

utter hopelessness of canning the opposite heights, and of con-
tending against the overwhelmingly superior numbers of the
enemy, without artillery or reinforcements to suppoi't ns, hav-
ing been fully tested, Gen. Bi-eckinridge ordered his division
to fall back. It M'as nearly dark when the conflict closed, and
during the night he occupied a portion of the field in advance
of that he occupied during the day.

It was after the capture of the enemy's position on the ridge,
when our men drove him across the river with terrible slaugh-
ter of his forces, that the noble Hanson fell mortally wounded,
exclaiming, " Forward — forward, my brave boys, to the
charge ;" and afterwards, when brought from the field, he said
with his flickering breath, " I am willing to die with such a
wound received in so glorious a cause." "We had held the
enemy's position on the ridge for about half an hour, Capt.
E. E. Wright's battery doing admirable execution, when that
gallant officer fell at his guns mortally wounded, the enemy
having charged within seventy-five yards of his pieces.

The final repulse of Breckenridge was a sad blow to our
hopes, xlie prudence of this terrible attack upon the impreg-
nable position of the enemy has been seriously questioned, and
military critics of the battle of Murfreesboro' have also found
room for censuring the neglect of Gen. Bragg in not previously
securing the hillocks in the bend of Stone's river, which he
permitted the enemy to occupy. As it happened, it was a bad
repulse, and the vivid recollections of the " bloody crossing of
Stone's river," in which in less than one hour two thousand
of our men were killed and wounded, long survived in our
army. It lost us the vantage ground we had gained over the
enemy on the 31st and greatly depressed our troops. But for
this we would still have held Murfreesboro'. On the 3d the
rain fell in torrents, and as our troops were worn out and
nearly exhausted, it was determined to fall back that night,
and not run the risk of meeting the enemy's reinforcements,
which, it was reported, he was receiving. Every thing had
previously been provided for the retreat. It was conducted
with order and composure.*

* In Ms official report of the battle, Gen. Bragg makes the foUoAying state-
ment on the subject of the first day's operations, relative to their check and the
failure to break the enemy's centre :

}u

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 215

StHidayriiorning llosecrans moved into Murfreesboro', and
Gen. Bragg retired to the position of Tullahoma. Tliis place
is in Coffee county, Tennessee, situated on Rock creek, and
offers admirable means of defence. It is seventy-one miles
from Nashville and thirty-two from Murfreesboro', and lies im-
mediately on the Nashville and Chattanooga railroad, where
it is intersected by the McMinnville and Manchester road. As
a base of operations, and as a position of defence, the place
offered great advantages.

So far as the relative amount of carnage affects the question
of victor}'-, no doubt can be entertained to which side in the
battle of Murfreesboro' is to be ascribed the superiority. In
the first day's fight, the number of the enemy's killed and
wounded was probably six or seven thousand ; in the engage-
ment which succeeded, our loss was disproportionate to the
enemy's ; but at the close of the whole affair, the Yankees were
doubtless greater losers in life than ourselves. In point of cap-

" To meet our successful advance, and retrieve bis losses in the front of his
left, the enemy early transferred a portion of his reserve from his left to that
flank, and by two o'clock had succeeded in concentrating such a force in Liea-
tenant-gen. Hardee's front as to check his further progress. Our two lines had
by this time become almost blended, so weakened were they by losses, exhaus-
tion, and extension to cover the enemy's whole front. As early as 10 o'clock,
A. M., Major-gen. Breckenridge was called on for one brigade, and soon after for
a second, to reinforce or act as a reserve to Lieutenant gen. Hardee. His reply
to the first call represented the enemy crossing Stone's river in heavy force, in
his immediate front, and on receiving the second order, he informed me that
they had already crossed in heavy force, and were advancing to attack his
lines. He was immediately ordered not to await attack, but to advance and
meet him. About this same time a report reached me that a heavy force of
the enemy's infantry was advancing on the Lebanon road, about five miles in
Breckenridge's front. Brigadier-gen. Pegram, who had been sent to that road
to cover the flank of the infantry with his cavalry brigade, save two regiments
detached with Wheeler and Wharton, was ordered forward immediately to de-
velop any such movement. The orders for the two brigades from Brecken-
ridge were countermanded, whilst dispositions were made, at his request, to re-
inforce him. Before they could be carried out, the movements ordered disclosed
the fact that no force had crossed Stone's river ; that the only enemy in oui
immediate front then was a small body of sharpshooters ; and that there was
no advance on the Lebanon road. These unfortunate misapprehensions on that
part of the field, which with proper precaution could not have existed, withlield
from active operations three fijie brigades until the enemy had succeeded in
checking our progress, had re-established his lines, and had collected many o1
his broken battalions."

216 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE.

tures and with respect to tlie number of prisoners taken, the
battle of Murfreesboro' may be accounted a Confederate suc-
cess. The ground which the North has for claiming a victory
is, that our forces fell back, and that their positions were occu-
pied. But the (occupation of Murfreesboro' was no important
consideration ; the works were neither extensive nor strong ;
and the new line of defence reorganized by Gen. Bragg was,
as we shall see, quite sufficient to hold the enemy in check.
The truth is, that the Yankees, although their claims to the
victory of Murfreesboro' are questionable, had great reasons
to congratulate themselves that an army which, in the first
day's battle, had its riglit wing broken and one-third of its ar-
tillery lost, should have escaped destruction and extricated
itself in a manner to assure its further safety.

But however the issue of Murfreesboro' is to be decided, the
South had reason to expect considerable material advantages
from events in other parts of the West. The siege of Yicks-
burg by land was for the time virtually abandoned. Some
engagements had taken place before this town, which were ex-
aggerated by the telegraph ; but they were mere skirmishes,
intended to feel the strength of the defences. Being satisfied
that they were too strong to be attacked with safety, and prob-
ably learning that Grant's army would never effect a junction
with it, the Yankee force before Yicksburg re-embarked, with
a great loss of material employed in the intrenchments pre-
paratory to the siege.

THE KECAPTTJKK OF GALVESTON.

"While the new year had doubtfully opened in Tennessee, a
brilliant success marked the same period in the distant State
of Texas. An expedition was skilfully planned and gallantly
executed by the brave and energetic Magruder, the results of
which were the capture of the city and harbor of Galveston,
a large quantity of arms, ammunition, stores, etc., the famous
Yankee steamer Harriet Lane, and some other craft of less
importance.

On the night of the 31st of December, Gen. Magruder silently
marched along the road to Galveston city. Our forces con-
sisted of several regiments of infantry and about twenty-two

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 217

pieces of artillery, though the principal attack was to be made
bj the artillery, as there were only about three hundred of the
enemy in the city, and they were behind a barricade at the
outer end of the wharf.

Our troops reached the suburbs of the city about three
o'clock. The streets were completely deserted ; the few in-
habitants who had remained in the city were sleeping soundly,
and had our men not awaked and warned them of their danger,
they would have slept on until the cannon's roar had startled
them. The march of our troops through the city was a quiet
procession.

The scene, the dead hour of night, and the fact that this was
to be the first battle of many of them, all conspired to make
them serious. Then, too, the great heavy waves came tum-
bling and roaring in from the Gulf, chanting out upon the still
night air, as they dashed along, something that sounded like a
funeral dirge. But onward our men stole, through long, lonely
sti*feets, now around this corner and now turning that, until at
length they reached Strand-street, which runs parallel with
V the water, and is the next one to the wharves. The moon
was now down, and every thing was enveloped in darkness;
the guns were noiselessly placed in position and loaded, the
men looking like so many shadows as they took their places in
the gloom. There, within three hundred yards lay the Har-
riet Lane, the Owasso, the Clifton, and two other boats, with
their broadsides turned towards our troops, and ready to open
upon them the moment they fired. This they knew, for the
Yankees had been ashore the day before and told the people
that they knew all about the plans of the "rebels," and were
waiting for them. In fact, they were so certain of victory that
they allowed our men to place their guns in position without
firing upon them.

Gen. Magruder opened the attack by firing the first gun.
In a few moments the bright flashes, the booming reports, and
whizzing shells told plainer than words that the action had begun
in earnest ; for the next hour the roar of cannon was incessant.
The clear keen crack of our little rifled guns, the dull sound
of our sea-coast howitzers, and the mighty thundering bass of
the columbiads and 100-pound Parrott guns on tlie gunboats,
combined to form a piece of music fitted for Pandemonium.

218 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAR.

The fight raged furiously on both sides, but it was fast be-
coming evident that our land forces alone were no match for
the Yankee boats, with their great guns and mortars, which
vomited a half bushel of grape and canister at every discharge.
Early in the engagement a charge was made by three hundred
of our infantry on three companies of the 42d Massachusetts
regiment, stationed behind a barricade at the end of Kuhn's
wharf. The enemy had torn up the planks from the wharf, and
made a breastwork of them. Our men rushed out into the
waters with their scaling ladders and dashed up to them, but
the position was too strong and they had to retire, leaving our
artillery to shell them out. We lost some ten or fifteen in this
charge, and would have lost more, but it was pitch dark and
the Yankees fired very wildly.

Daylight at length arrived, and every one was anxiously
looking for our boats, which ought to have been up two hours
before. They had come down within sight at about 12 o'clock,
and, hearing nothing of our troops, retired five or six miles,
under the impression that the land attack had been postponed.
There they waited until about three o'clock, when the land
attack began. As soon as Major Smith, who commanded the
expedition, saw that the work had begun, he ordered all steam
to be put on and started back. He was then a considerable
distance from the city, and was unable to reach it until day-
light. At that time the Bayou City and Neptune, followed in
the distance by the John F. Can and Lucy Gvvinn, hospital
boats, bore steadily down upon the Harriet Lane, then lying at
the end of the wharf, opposite the Cotton Press.

The Harriet Lane had for some time directed her fire at
them, but fortunately without etfect; but when within about
fifty yards, the Neptune received several balls, damaging her
considerably. She kept steadily on her way, however, and in
a few moments more ran into the Lane amidship. The enemy's
decks were soon cleared with the buckshot from the double-
barrel guns of the Neptune's crew, who would have boarded
her, but it was discovered that the Neptune was rapidly sink-
ing, in consequence of the damages she had received. She was
accordingly run into shoal water, about fifty yards from the
Lane, where she sunk immediately. In the mean time the
Yankee crew, seeing the predicament of the Neptune, came

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 219

up on deck again, and were preparing to give her a broadside,
when the Bayou Cirj fortunately interfered with their prepa-
rations, by running into the Lane's wlieel-house. Another
volley of buckshot again cleared her decks. The next instant
the crew of the Bayou City were aboard of her, Major Smith
gallantly leading the way, and shooting the Lane's command-
ing officer (Capt. Wainwright) as he leaped upon the deck.
The vessel was immediately surrendered, and down came the
Stars and Stripes and up Avent our flag. It was found that the
captain and first lieutenant of the boat were both killed, and
about thirty of her crew killed or wounded. Our loss on the
boats was about sixteen killed, and thirty wounded.

The Yankee boats, the Clifton and Owasso, saved themselves
by beating out of the harbor, while the Bayou City was in
some way entangled with her prize. The Westfield was burnt,
as she was fast aground. Our prize was one of which we
might well be proud. The Harriet Lane was a vessel of six
hundred tons burden, was originally built for the revenue ser-
vice, but at the beginning of the war with the South she was
turned over to the navy, and at once underwent such altera-
tions as were thought necessary to adapt her to her new ser-
,vice. At the time of her capture, she mounted eight guns of
heavy calibre, her bow gun being a fifteen-inch rifle.

The recapture of Galveston and the advantages which en-
sued, were perhaps outbalanced by a disaster which shortly
followed and overshadowed much of the prospect in the remote
regions west of the Mississippi. This was the forcible occupa-
tion by the Yankees of Arkansas Post and the surrender of its
entire garrison.

The troops garrisoning Arkansas Post at the time of attack,
consisted of three brigades, mostly Texans, and commanded
respectively by Cols. Garland, Deshler, and Dunnington, the
whole forming a division under the command of Brigadier-
gen. T. J. Churchill, and numbering, on the day of the fight,
not more than thirty-three hundred eflective men. On the 9th
day of January a scout from below brought intelligence to
Gen. Churchill of a Yankee gunboat having made its appear-
ance in the Arkansas river, some thirty miles below tlie Post.
Some hours later, on the same day, another scout brought news
of other gunboats, followed by transports, making their way

220 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

up the river. Upon the receipt of this intelligence, Gen.
Churchill ordered every thing in readiness for an attack, and
ere night closed in, all the troops were distributed along the
line of intrenchments, where they remained all night, in a
pelting storm of rain. The enemy, in the mean time, had
landed a force about two miles below the fort, but they made
no demonstration until about nine or ten o'clock the next morn-
ing, when tliey commenced shelling the fort from their advance
gunboats, that were cautiously and slowly feeling their way up
the river.

Our troops held the position first taken by them until about
four o'clock, p. M., when the general, fearing a flank movement
on our left, ordered the men to fall back to a line of intrench-
ments near the yet unfinished fort, which line was speedily
completed and all the troops properly distributed before night
set in. Just as darkness was drawing near, four gunboats ap-
proached the fort and commenced their bombardment, our
guns from the fort answering gallantly ; and after two hours'
terrific shelling, the gunboats retired, one of them, the East-
port, badly disabled. Our loss up to this time consisted of
only three killed and some three or four wounded.

The next morning, at ten o'clock, the enemy renewed the
attack with gunboats and land forces combined. They had
also erected a battery on the opposite side of the river, by
means of wliich they kept up a terrible cross-fire that swept
the whole area of ground occupied by our men. The tiring
continued until about four o'clock in the evening, when Gen.
Churchill, seeing his defences exposed to a raking fii-e and
storming parties closing upon his rear, surrendered. Gen.
McClernand taking the whole force, making more than three
thousand men prisoners. Our loss in killed and wounded was
not two hundred men.

The results of this success of the Yankees were many thou-
sand prisoners of war, and a fortified point guarding the navi-
gation of tlie Arkansas river, and shutting out its commerce
from the Mississippi. But the prospect which they indulged
of ascending without interruption to Little Rock and taking
full possession of the Arkansas capital, was rather premature.

There is nothing yet important to record of the operations
of the immense fleets of the enemy collected on our coast in

THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAR. 221

the winter of 1862. The armadas were as yet silent. For
months a large fleet of the enemy had been at the mouth of
Charleston harbor, or picketed off the coast.

On the 30th of January the Confederate rams in the harbor
of Charleston, under command of Capt. Ingraham, had made a
sally towards the enemy's fleet. The success of this sally was
ignorantly exaggerated by the Confederates, and a claim made
that the blockade had been raised, which pretension was after-
wards abandoned. The fact was, that one of the Yankee ves-
sels— the Mercedita — was seriously injured, and another — the
Keystone State — got a shot through her steam-drum, causing
the death of twenty-one persons. The Mercedita M^as saved by
the treachery of tlie Yankees, who represented the sliip to be
in a sinking condition, thus deceiving the Confederates as to
the extent of the damage they had inflicted. She steamed
down to Port Royal, after our rams had left her, under the sup-
position that she was sinking in shoal water. Her commander
had called out, " "We are in a sinking condition," and the reply
of Capt. Ingraham was that she could only sink as far as her
rails, and we could not take her crew aboard. A mean and
cowardly falsehood saved the vessel, but in Yankee estimation
the triumphs of such villany were quite equal to the congratu-
lations of a victory.

Our victory at Galveston, of which we have given some
account, was the precursor of other captures of the enemy's
vessels, which were important accessions to our little navy.
That arm of service, in which we were so deficient, and had
shown such aptitude for self-destruction, was not entirely pow-
erless ; for we not only had rams for harbor defences and three
fleet privateers at sea, but our power on the water was enlarged
even beyond our expectations, as we shall see, by captures
from the enemy.

The Yankee gunboat Queen of the "West, having succeeded
in running our batteries at Yicksburg, had for some weeks
been committing ravages, penetrating the country of the Red
river. On the 14th of February she encountered in this river
and captured a small Confederate steamer, the Era. The crew
and passengers of the Era were taken prisoners, and all were
guarded on board the Era by a band of soldiers, save Mr.
George Wood, the pilot, who was ordered aboard the Queen

223 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

of the "West, and, with threats, directed to her pilot-wheel to
assist her pilot in directing her onward to the captnre of our
fort on the river. On thej glided, but not distrustful, and
much elated at their success, till they came in reach of our
battery at five p. m., when the vessel commenced firing, still
advancing. She had come within a quarter of a mile of our
battery and on the opposite shore in full range for our guns,
when the gallant Wood, who directed her wheel, had her
rounded, ran her aground, breaking her rudder and thus crip-
pling her and turning her broadside to give our guns a fair
chance. This gallant man, in the confusion, made good his
escape. Thus crippled and disabled by the hand that drove
her on to her destiny, she lay like a wounded falcon, at the
mercy of her adversaries.

The night was dark and stormy, the heavens overhung with
clouds, which now and then pealed forth their muttering thun-
der, and drenched the earth with rain. Thus in the rain-storm
this crippled Queen lay beaten by the tempest. She was well
barricaded with cotton bales. On seeing all hope of success
gone, the commanding officer, Col. Ellett, made his escape,
with nearly all his crew, by getting on cotton bales and float-
ing down the river. She raised the white signal, as the storm
abated, as it was seen by the liglit of a burning warehouse, but
it was not answered till next morning. Thirteen of the crew
remained in silence till daylight, then her white banner was
still afloat, and then, and not till then, our soldiers crossed the
river and took possession of her.

The fog which had enabled the Queen of the West to get by
Yicksburg had also availed for the passage of another gunboat,
the Indianola. This vessel had also continued for weeks to go
at large, preying on the boats that were transporting our sup-
plies, and harassing our forces in every way. Seeing the great
injury and havoc that she might do, a council was held, and
the capture of the Indianola at every sacrifice was determined
upon.

Accordingly an expedition was fitted out, consisting of two
gunboats — the Queen of the West and the Webb — and two
steamers — the Era and Dr. Batey. The expedition was com-
manded b}' Major Walker, with Captain Hutton as executive
officer of the fleet. All being ready, the expedition started

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR, 223

out from the mouth of the Red river in pui'suit of the Indian-
ola. Coming up the Mississippi to Grand Gulf, it was learned
that the Indianola was not far off, and a halt was ordered that
all the vessels might come up. All being in line, the expedi-
tion put up the river, and on the 24th of February came upon
the Indianola, overhauling her about five miles below New
Carthage, and some thirty below Yicksburg. It was about
nine o'clock at night. Tlie enemy had received no information
of the movement, and was not aware of our approach until we
were within a half mile of her. Seeing the rapid approach of
the vessels, the Indianola at once knew that it was an attempt
to capture her, and she immediately rounded her broadside to,
lashing a coal barge alongside her to parry the blows that
might be made to run in and sink her. On the vessels nearing,
lire was opened, and a most terrific and desperate engagement
ensued, lasting over an hour. Putting on all her steam, the
Queen of the "West made a blow at the Indianola, cleaving the
barge in two and striking her with such treriiendous force that
the Indianola's machinery was badly injured. Here the action
on both sides became desperate. The blow of the Queen of
the West was quickly followed up by the Webb with a terrific
" butt" at full speed. This finished the work. Tlie Indianola
was discovered to be in a sinking condition, and was put for
the shore on .the Louisiana side. Seeing this, the Dr. Batey
was ordered to board her. On bearing alongside her, the In-
dianola surrendered, and all her oflicers and crew — number-
ing in all about one hundred and twenty men — were made
prisoners.

Tiiese additions to our naval structures on the Mississippi
were important. We now possessed some power in the inte-
rior waters of the Confederacy^ ; to our harbor defences we had
already added some rams ; and our deficiency in a navy was
not a laughingstock to the North as long as our few privateers
were able to cruise in the Atlantic, and carry dismay to the
exposed commerce of the Gulf.

The few ships the North possessed that were the equals in
point of speed of the Confederate privateers, the Alabama and
Florida, were, with a single exception, purchased vessels, built
for the merchant service, and exceedingly liable to be disabled
in their machinery on account of its being nearly all above the

224 THE SECOND TEAE OF THE WAR.

water-line. Taking, as samples of vessels of tliis class, the
Yanderbilt, Connecticut, and Kliode Island, the North had
three ships which, for the purpose tliey were intended, were
without superiors ; but the chances were that, if coming under
the fire of the Alabama or Florida, thej would be, by a well-
directed shot or shell at close quarters, crippled and become an
easy prize.

The exploits of our cruisers were sufficient to show the value
and efficiency of the weapon of privateering, and to excite
many regrets that our means in this department of warfare
were so limited. One national steamer alone— the Alabama —
commanded by officers and manned by a crew who were de-
barred by the closure of neutral ports from the opportunity
of causing captured vessels to be condemned in their favor as
prizes, had sufficed to double the rates of marine insurance in
Yankee ports, and consigned to forced inaction numbers of
Yankee vessels, in addition to the direct damage inflicted by
captures at sea. The Northern papers paid a high tribute to
the activity and daring of our few privateers in the statement
that, during one month of Avinter, British steamers had carried
from San Francisco to Europe six and a quarter millions of
gold, whilst during the same time from the same port there
had arrived in New York only two hundred and fifty thou-
sand dollars of the precious metal. In view of such results,
it would be difficult to over-estimate the effects, if we had
had a hundred of private armed vessels, and especially if we
could have secured from neutral Europe the means of dis-
posing of such prizes as we might make of the commerce of
the enemy.

THE SECOXD YEAE OF THE WAR. 225

• CHAPTER IX.

An extraordinary Lull in the War. — An Affair with the Enemy on the Black-
water. — Raids in the West. — Van Dorn's Captures. — The Meeting of Congress. —
Character of this Body. — Its Diilness and Servility. — Mr. Foote and the Cabinet. —
Two Popular Themes of Confidence. — Party Contention in the North. — Successes of
tlie Democrats there. — Analysis of tlie Party Politics of the North. — The Interest of
New England in tlie War. — How the War affected the Northwestern Portions of the
United States. — Mr. Foote's Kesolutions respectingr the Northwestern States. — How
tliey were received by the Southern Public. — New War Measures at Wasliington. —
Lincoln a Dictator. — Prospect of Foreign Interference. — Action of the Emperor Na-
poleon.— Suffering of the Working Classes in England. — The Delusions of an early
Peace. — The Tasks before Congress. — Prostrate Condition of the Confederate Fi-
nances.— President Davis's Blunder. — The Errors of our Financial System. — The
Wealth of the South. — The Impressment Law of Congress. — Scarcity of Supplies. —
Inflated Prices. — Speculation and Extortion in the Confederacy. — Three Kemarks
about these. — The Verdict of History.

The battle of Murfreesboro' was followed by an extraordi-
nary lull of the movements of the war. For months the great
armies in Tennessee and Yirginia were to stand agaze of each
other. The events of this period are slight, and easily re-
counted.

While the lines of the Rappahannock remained undisturbed,
our forces on the Blackwater had an engagement of outposts
on the 31st of January, which was unduly magnified into a
battle. The success of the affair was not wholly unimportant,
as a loss of some hundreds was inflicted upon the enemy before
our forces fell back to Carrsville, which they were compelled
to do in the face of superior numbers.

In Tennessee there was a series of exploits of our cavalry,
the details of which it is impossible now to recount. The most
remarkable of these successes was probably that of Yan Dorn.
wlio, on the 1st day of March, at Thompson's station, between
Columbia and Franklin, captured five regiments of the enemy's
infantry, comprising twenty-two hundred oflScers and men.

THE MEETING OF CONGRESS.

The reader will be interested in. turning from the unim-
portant military events of this period to notice the reassem-

15

2'2G THK SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

bling of the Confederate Congress, and its proceedings in the
early months of 1863. It is not to be disguised that this body
fell below the spirit and virtue of the people, and was remark-
able for its- destitution of talents and ability. Not a singlo
speecli that has yet been made in it will live. It is true that
the regular Congress, elected by the people, was an improve-
ment upon tbe ignorant and unsavory body known as the Pro-
visional Congress, which was the creature of conventions, and
which was disgraced in the character of some of its members;
among whom were conspicuous corrupt and senile politicians
from Virginia, who had done all they could to sacrifice and
degrade their State, who had "toadied" in society, as well as
in politics, to notabilities of New England, and who had taken
a prominent part in emasculating, and, in fact, annulling the
Sequestration Law, in order to save the property of relatives
who had sided with the North against the land that had borne
them and honored their fathers.

But the regular Congress, although it had no taint of dis-
loyalty or Yankee toadyism in it, was a weak body. It had
made no mark in the history of the government; it was desti-
tute of originality ; its measures were, generally, those which
were recommended by the Executive, or suggested by the news-
papers; it had produced no great financial measure'; it made
not one stroke of statesmanship ; it uttered not a single fiery
appeal to the popular heart, such as is customary in revolu-
tions. It afforded, perhaps, a proof of the frequent assertion
that our democratic system did not produce great men. The
most of the little ability it had was occupied with servility to
the Executive and demagogical displays.

It is difficult, indeed, for a legislative body to preserve its
independence, and to resist the tendency of the p]xecutive'to
, absorb power in time of war, and this fact was well illustrated
by the Confederate Congress. One of the greatest political
scholars of America, Mr. Madison, noticed this danger in the
political constitution of the country. He said: — "War is in
fact the true nurse of Executive aggrandizement. In war a
physical force is to be created, and it is the Executive will
which is to direct it. In war the public treasures are to be
unlocked, and it is the Executive hand which is to dispense
them. In war the honors and emoluments of otfice are to be

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE. 227

multiplied, and it is the Executive patronage under which they
are to be enjoyed. It is in war, finally, tliat laurels are to l^e
gathered, and it is the Executive brow they are to encircle."

There was but little opposition in Congress to President
Davis ; but there was some which took a direction to liis cabi-
net, and this opposition was represented by Mr. Foote of Ten-
nessee— a man of acknowledged ability and many virtues of
character, who had re-entered upon the political stage after a
public life, which, however it lacked in the cheap merit of
partisan consistency, had been adorned by displays of wonder-
fid intellect and great political genius. Mr. Foote was not a
man to be deterred from speaking the truth ; his quickness to
resbntment and his chivalry, which, though somewhat Quixotic,
was founded in the most noble and delicate sense of honor,
made those who would have bullied or silenced a weaker per-
son stand in awe of him. A man of such temper was not
likciy to stint words in assailing an opponent ; and his sharp
declamations in Congress, his searching comments, and his
grtat powers of sarcasm, used upon such men as Mallory,
Ij'-Mijamin, and J^orthrop, were the only relief of the dulness of
the Congress, and the only historical features of its debates.

Mr. Foote w^as of a temperament that easily indulged the
prospects of peace which so generally existed when Congress
resumed its session in the opening of the new year. At an
early period of the session resolutions were introduced by him
inviting the Northwestern States to abstention from the war,
and expressing a lively and friendly confidence in the negotia-
tion which the Emperor of the French had just undertaken
for a qualified mediation in the war in America. Of these two
popular themes of confidence some explanation is due.

Since the commencement of the war, there had been some
few people in the North who had opposed its prosecution, and
many more who were averse to its policy and measures. The
removal of McClellan added a bitter feud to animosities al-
ready existing, and the enunciation at Washington of the
policy of emancipation contributed to the party divisions in
the North. The result of the Northern elections in the fall of
lS(;i2 was apparently an emphatic and impressive popular ver-
dict against the Abolition party, which had ruled the govern-
ment at Washington. In the face of a majority of 107,000

228 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK.

against them in 1860, the Democrats had carried the State of
New York. The metropolis of New York was carried by a
Democratic majority of 31,000 — a change of 48,000 votes in
twelve months. Within the great States of New Jersey, New
York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, the results of
the popular elections were a more or less emphatic avowal of
opposition to the schemes of those who were using the power of
the government to advance and fasten upon the country their
political vagaries, regardless of right and written constitutions.
These six States contained a majority of the free State popula-
tion. They furnished the majority of the troops in the field
against us. They had two-thirds of the wealth of the North.
It was clear that the Washington government needed men
and money to carry on the war, and to have a united North
the Democratic States must furnish more than half of either.

Under these circumstances, it is not surprising that the
people of the South should have cnnvinced themselves that an
important reaction was taking place in public sentiment in the
North, and that it naturally tended to a negotiation for peace.
But in one-half of this opinion they were mistaken. There
was a reaction in the North ; but it had scarcely any thing
more than a partisan significance. It was a struggle between
those in power and those out of power ; the issues of which
■were feigned and exaggerated ; in which much that was said
against the war was not really meant ; and at the close of
which the passions it had excited suddenly evaporated. Mr.
Yan Buren, who, in the Democratic campaign in New York,
had made speeches quite warm enough for Southern latitudes,
was after tlie elections an advocate of the war and a mocker
of " the rebellion." Many more followed the distinguished
lead of the demagogue in raising a clamor about the admin-
istration merely for party purposes, and having served those
purposes, in returning to the advocacy of a war,sin which, by
giving false encouragement to the North, and holding out
hopes of " reconstruction," they were enemies more fatal to
the South than the blind and revengeful radicals who sought
her destruction.

It is probable that the movements in the Northwestern
States against the administration were better founded in prin-
ciple than those that had taken place in other j^arts of the

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK. 229

North, and that they denoted a sincere aversion to the war.
The opposition of Mr. Vallandigham, who assumed to repre-
sent this sentiment of the Northwest in Congress, was appa-
rently superior to the demagogical clamor of such men as
Yan Buren and Seymour of New York. The sentiment was
nndoubtedly sincere, whatever the merits or demerits of its
officious representative.*

The pecuniary interest of New England in the war was
plain enough. The demand for the products of her industry
for objects of this war was greater than at any former period
in the history of this continent. Her workshops were in full
blast. Ships and locomotives were to be built, the weapons of
war were to be created, and the ironmongers of New England
found a vast and profitable employment in answering these
demands. The spinners and weavers and blanket-makers and
artisans were kept busy at their avocations, and everywhere in
these avaricious districts of the North arose the hum of profit-
able industry.

But while New England rioted in the gains of the war, it
was stark ruin to the agricultural States of the Northwest.

* There is unavoidable reason for doubting the virtue of Mr. Vallandigham.
It is difficult to discover the motives of the Yankee. The people of the South
have reason to know, from former political association with this faithless race,
how indii'ect are their courses and how aflFocted their zeal. What appears to be
the inspiration of virtue, may be the deep design of a selfish ambition ; singu-
larity of opinion may prove nothing but an itch for a cheap reputation ; and
an extraordinary display of one's self before the public may, at best, be but
the ingenious trick of a charlatan.

When Mr. Vallandigham was exiled for obstructing enlistments in tlie
North, he had an opportmiity, in his travels in the Confederacy, of learning the
sentiments of the people, and of these he gave the following report in an ad-
dress to the people of Ohio :

" Travelling a thousand miles and more through neai-ly one-half of the Con-
federate States, and sojourning for a time at widely different points, I met not
one man, woman, or child, who were not resolved to perish rather than yield
to the pressure of arms, even in the most desperate extremity.

Neither, hoioever, let me add, did I meet any one, whut-
ever Ids opinion or station, political or private, who did not declare his readi-
ness, when the icar shall have ceased and invading armies he withdrawn, to con-
sider and discuss the question of reunion. And who shall doubt the issue of
the argument ?"

A man who can be guilty of such a deliberate falsehood, and one evidently
planned to catch votes for his political hobby, can certainly make no preten-
sion to heroism, and may even have his claims to honesty justly doubted.

230 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK.

The people there were growing poorer every day in the midst
of plenty. The great Southern market which their resources
supplied had been closed, and there was no new demand for
tneir agricultural products. The corn, wheat, and bacon of
Indiana and Illinois were scarcely worth the cost of transporta-
tion to the Atlantic coast. The railroads connecting the West
with the seaboard were principally in the hands of the Eastern
capitalists, ard the rates of freight were so enormous, that the
surplus agricultural product of the Northwestern farmers wa's
in many instances left to rot on their lands, or be used as fuel.

This violent contrast between New England and the "West,
in the effects on each of the war, w^as developed in a formida-
ble opposition of opinion. Indications of this opposition had
already been given in the press of St. Louis and Chicago.
The jealousy of the agricultural States of the North was being
inflamed by the unequal profits of the war and the selfish
policy of the Abolitionists ; and the opinion plainly grew in
the press and public discussion that tlie West had not a single
interest in the war beyond securing the free navigation of the
Mississippi.

How far statesmanship in the South might have profited by
this disaffection in the Northwestern States is left a matter of
conjecture and controversy. The efforts made in the Confed-
erate Congress by Mr. Foote in tliis direction, tendering to
these States a complete assurance of the free navigation of the
Mississippi, and proposing an alliance with the Confederacy,
without political complications, met with feeble encourage-
ment in that body, a doubtful response from the army, and
divided comments of the press. AVhatever may have been the
merits of Mr. Foote's proposition, it admitted of no delay.
While our government treated it with hesitation, the authori-
ties at Wasliington were making anxious and immense prepar-
ations to overcome the disaffection of the people and to carry
on the war ; and the means to do this were supplied by an act
suspending the habeas corpus, and making Lincoln absolute
dictator ; by new measures of finance, and by a conscription
law which called into the field three million of men.

The prospect of a termination of the war by any action of
foreign governments, was more distant than that afforded by
pai'ty elections and movements in the North. This action was

THK SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 231

limited to the French Emperor alone ; it liad not progressed
further at this time than an invitation to England and Russia,
made in November, 1862, to unite in proposing an armistice to
the Waslrngton government, which should merely give an op-
j^ortunity fur discussion, without affecting in any way the pres-
ent military interests and positions of the belligerents. Mild
as the French pi'oposition was, it was rejected by Russia. and
England. Lord Russell replied for his government that tlie
time was not lipe for such raediatiim as was proposed, and that
it would be better to watch carefully tlie progress of opinion in
America, and wait for some change in which the three Courts
could offer their friendly counsel with a prospect of success.
The British statesman had nothing to plead for the mass of
suffering humanity in his own land, which the war he was im-
ploi-ed to stop or to ameliorate had occasioned ; for humanity
was easily outweighed by political reasons, which are as often
worked out through the blood and tears of its own people as
through the misfortunes of others.*

* In a letter of Mr. Cobden, published during the early winter in an English
journal, he declares that in travelling from Manchester to Blackburn, over a
country covered v?ith snow, he found hundreds of wasted victims of cold and
want. He says : " Hitherto the distressed population have felt little more than
the want of food. Now and from henceforth blankets, fuel, and clothing are
as essential to health as bread and soup." He argues that it is useless to save
people from dying by hunger, only that they may perish by fever, or by the
exhaustion consequent on cold and insuflScient food.

The early advent of winter enhanced the misery of the suffering. In many
districts there was no fuel, po means of warmth except the scanty allowance
of coals distributed in some places by the Relief Committees. Everywhere
the people had too little to eat, and that little was not sufEciently nutritious ;
everywhere they suffered from cold yet more cruelly than from hunger ; and
nowhere was there a fund sufficient to provide for their necessities.

The humane shuddered with horror as they read the frightful accounts of
the suffering of the poor published day after day in the London Times. A
letter from Stockport described the people there as " suffering all the horrors
of a protracted famine." The same writer saj's : " One poor man upon whom
I called this morning, having stripped the walls of every little ornament to
purchase bread for his wife and three little children, took the fender and sold
it for a shilling." The cases of distress reported in the newspapers merely
represented the average condition of the unemployed. An aged couple, we are
told, had saved thirty-six pounds ; this is gone, tlieir furniture is pawned, the
husband is in the infirmary, and the old woman living on a charitable dole of
half a cro^vn per week, with some soup and bread. In another case five per-
Bons, among them a sick woman, are living on seven shilling-s a wegk. One

232 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE "WAE.

But while the prospect of an early peace dissolved before
the eyes of Congress, a subject of instant and practical impor-
tance was sorely pressing upon its attention. The vast volume
of Treasury notes issued by the government had occasioned a
rapid depreciation of our currency, inflated prices, and pro-
duced serious financial difficulties. So crude and short-sighted
had been our notions of public finance, that at the meeting of
Congress in August, 1862, we find President Davis recom-
mending to it that the public creditors should not be paid in
bonds, but that unlimited issues of currency should be made.
He then said in his written message to Congress : " The legis-
lation of the last session provided for the purchase of supplies
with the bonds of the government, but the preference of the
people for Treasury notes has been so marked, that legislation
is recommended to authorize an increase in the issue of Treas-
ury notes, which the public service seems to require. No
grave inconvenience need be apprehended from this increased
issue, as the provision of law by which these notes are con-
vertible into eight per cent, bonds, forms an efficient and per-

family of six — considered to be particularly well off — have seven sliillings, an
allowance of coals and some soup and bread from their former employer. An-
other family of six or seven had lived for twelve months on six shillings a
week.

The University of Oxford had subscribed about £4000 towards the relief of
the suffering people. A meeting was held to promote further action, at which
the following facts were stated by the Hon. E. L. Stanley of Baliol College :

" They received from America before the blockade five-sixths of their cotton ;
five days of the week they worked on what came from America ; only one day
on what camo from other countries. That supply was now practically at an
end. The few ships that ran the blockade made no noticeable difference, and
even if other countries should double their production, we should be only sup-
plied with material for one-third of our usual work. The country, then, was
losing two-thirds of the industry engaged in this trade, and two-thirds of the
capital were making no return. And this trade was such a main part of the
industry of the nation, that what affected it must affect all. A Parliamentary
return gave the persons actually engaged in the mills at near 500,000. If they
reckoned their families, the traders who supplied them, the colliers, machinists,
builders, and shipping interest engaged in supplying cotton, they would proba-
bly not overstate the number of dependents on cotton only at 3,000,000. These
people were now deprived of fully two- thirds of their subsistence."

Such is a picture of the " Cotton Famine" in England. The most remark,
able circumstance in connection with it was the profound indifference of the
English Ministry to the distress of near a million of those for whose lives and
happiness they were responsible.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 233

manent safeguard against any serious depreciation of the
currency.

The consequences of this ignorant and wild financial policy
were, that, by the next meeting of Congress, the volume of
currenc}'' was at least four times what were the wants of the
community for a circulating medium ; that prices were inflated
more than an equal degree, for want of confidence in the paper
of the government had kindled the fever of speculation ; that
the public credit, abused by culpable ignorance and obstinate
empiricism, had fallen to an ebb that alarmed the country
more than any reverse in the military fortunes of the war ;
and that the government was forced to the doubtful and not
very honorable expedient of attempting to restore its currency
by a system of demonetizing its own issues.

The redundancy of the currency was the chief cause of its
depreciation. The amount of money in circulation in the
South, in time of peace, was $80,000,000. In January, 1863,
it was $300,000,000. In September, 1861, Confederate notes
were about equal to specie ; before December, specie was at
20 per cent, premium; before April, 1862, it was at 50 per
cent.; before last September, at 100; before December, at
225 ; before February, at 280 ; and in the spring of 1863, at the
frightful premium of 400 per cent., while bank bills were worth
190 cents on the dollar.

Since the foundation of the Confederate government, its
finances had been grossly mismanaged. The Treasury note
was a naked promise to pay ; there was no fund pledged for
its redemption ; and the prospect of the rigid liquidation of the
enormous debt that this class of paper represented six months
after the restoration of peace, depended solely on the specula-
tive prospect of a foreign loan to the amount of many hun-
dred millions of dollars. At the commencement of tlie war
the South had the elements for the structure of one of the
most successful and elastic schemes of finance that the world
had seen. The planters were anxious to effect the sales of
their cotton and tobacco to the Confederate States ; these would
have supplied the government with a basis of credit which
would have been extended as the prices of these staples
advanced, and therefore kept progress with the war; but this
scheme was opposed by the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr.

23i THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

Memmhiger, and defeated by liis influence. He was unfortu-
nately sustained by an Executive grossly incompetent on sub-
jects of finance ; which was ignorant of the principle of political
economy, that there are no royal ways of making money
out of nothing, that governments must raise money in the
legitimate way of taxation, loans, &c. ; which relied upon the
manufjicture of a revenue out of naked paper obligations ; and
which actually went to the foolish extremity of recommending
that the creditors of the government should take their payment
in currency rather than in the public stocks. It appears,
indeed, that our government was ignorant of the most primitive
truths of finance, and that it had not read in history or in
reason the lesson of \\\q fatal connection hetween currency and
revenue.

It is true that some appreciation of this lesson was at last
shown by Congress in its new tax-bill ; for the theory of that
bill was, by an enormous weight of taxation, to pay, at least
measurably, the expenses of tlie war as it progressed, and to
risk no further connection between the two distinct financial
concerns of revenue and currency. But on the other hand, its
system of forcing the funding of treasury notes by arbitrary
reductions of interest, betrayed the ignorance of Congress ; left
incomplete and embarrassed a system of finance which might
have otherwise been carried to a point of extraordinary suc-
cess ; and aimed a direct blow at the integrity of the public
credit.

It was easy to see that slight diflferences in rates of interest
would atford but feeble inducements for the conversion of the
treasury note into the bond, when money was easily doubled
or quadrupled in the active commercial speculations peculiar
to the condition of the South in the war, unless the bond could
be readily used as a medium of exchanges ; and in that event
there would only be a change in the form of the paper, tlie
volume of the currency would be undiminished, and its depre-
ciation therefore remain the same. But while the analysis of
this system of funding shows it to be a transparent juggle, it
was by no means certain that it did not contain the germ of
many positive evils. The right of a government to make ar-
bitrary changes in any of the terms of its obligations which
affe t their value, is questionable, and the commercial honor

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 235

of sucli an expedient is more than doubtful. While it intro-
duced the shadow of repudiation only to weak and suspicious
minds, it is yet to be regretted that even whispers on that sub-
ject were ever heard in the South. But as far as our foreign
credit was concerned, there is no doubt that the empirical action
of Congress, which involved, even to the smallest extent, the in-
tegrity of our obligations, was of serious prejudice. It might
indeed have been logically and certainly expected that the gen-
eral confidence in Europe in the military fortunes of the Con-
federacy would have been productive of unlimited credit to us
abroad, had the faith of Europe in the management of our
finances equalled that in the success of our arms.*

On the subject of the financial management of the new Con-
federacy, one general reflection at least admits of no doubt.
The attentive reader will recognize as the most remarkable cir-
cumstance of this war, that within two years the public finances
of the Confederacy should have been brought to the brink of
ruin. The sympathy of the people with the revolution was
unbounded. The disposition of all classes towards the govern-
ment was one of extreme generosity. The property of the
States of the Confederacy was greater per capita than that of
any community on the globe. No country in the world had
export values comparable in magnitude to those of the South,
and the exports of all other countries were produced at a cost
in labor four times that of ours. In such circumstances it is
highly improbable that the government of the Confederacy

* It is true that a small foreign loan lias been negotiated in Europe ; but it
aflFords no test of our credit in present circumstances, as it was made on a pledge
of cotton. It sliows, however, what might have been done, if the cotton had
been purchased by the government and mobilized, for the whole crop might
have been secured in 1861 at seven cents a pound. But against this scheme
the government had set its face as flint, and when it did become distrustful of
its former conclusion, it had only the nerve to make a very limited experiment
in the application of this staple to support a credit almost hopelessly abijsed by
paper issues.

It was estimated that there remained in the States of the Confederacy at this
- time 3,500,000 bales of cotton, which could be exported in the event of the porta
being opened to trade. This estimate is made after deducting from the crops
of 1861 and 1863 the quantity of cotton which had run the blockade, the amount
destroyed to prevent capture by the Yankees, and the quantity used for home
consumption, which, since the commencement of the war, had enormously in«
creased, being now fully 500,000 bales per annmn.

236 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

could, within two years, have wrecked its credit with its own
people, unless by the most ignorant trifling with great ques-
tions and the childish management of its treasury.

At an early period of the war it had been our boast that we.
had spent only fifteen millions, while the Yankees had spent
ten or fifteen times that amount. But we find that the debt of
the general government of the Confederate States in January
last was $556,000,000, with the prospect, at the current rate
of expenditure, that it would reach nine hundred millions by
the close of the fiscal j-ear on the first of July ; and it is curi-
ous to observe what miscalculations were made of public debt
both in the North and in the South. The newspapers of the
two nations flourished the estimates of their debt in enume-
rations only of the obligations of the general government of
each, and made complacent comparisons of these sums ,with
the debts of European governments. But according to the
estimates of Europe, and the calculations of plain reason, the
true volume of the debt of each of these nations was repre-
sented not only by what was owed by the Kichmond and
Washington governments, but by the aggregate amount of the
indebtedness of the several States composing each confedera-
tion. Here could be the only true and just measure of the
national debt of either the South or the North, in comparison
with the debts of other governments, to which the system of
the division of powers between a central authority and States
was unknown. The debt of each member of the Southern
Confederacy, as well as that of a central authority, was a bur-
den on the nation, for the problem of its payment was at last
to resolve itself into a tax upon the people. It is only by a
calculation of these aggregates that just comparisons could be
made between our financial condition and that of the North or
European nations; and although such comparisons on our side
were to the disadvantage of our enemies, yet they exhibited
facts which were unpleasant enough to ourselves.

The law of impressment enacted by Congress aff'ords the
evidence of the scarcity of supplies in the South. The ques-
tion of food with that of finance divided the attention of the
government. The grain-growing and provision-raising c(>un-
try, which stretches from the Potomac at Harpers Ferry to
Memphis on the Tennessee, was now exhausted of it? provi-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR, 237

Bions. Mucli of the productive portions of North Carolina
and the Gulf States had been also exhausted. The great and
true source of meat supplj^, the State of Kentucky, which
contained more hogs and cattle, two or thi-ee to one, than were
left in all the South besides, had fallen into the undivided pos-
session of the Yankees. The general scarcity of all sorts of
supplies \vas attested by the high prices of every thing eatable.
The advance in prices induced by the scarcity of supplies, was
still further enormously enhanced by the greedy commercial
speculation which distressed the South, and threw a shadow of
dishonor npon the moral aspects of our struggle.

It is a subject of extraordinary remark, that the struggle
for our independence should have been attended by the ignoble
circumstances of a commercial speculation in the South unpar-
alleled in its heartlessness and selfish greed. War invariably
excites avarice and speculation ; it is the active promoter of
rapid fortunes and corrupt commercial practices. But it is a
matter of surprise that more than an ordinary share of this
bad, avaricious spirit should have been developed in the South
during a war which involved the national existence, which pre-
sented so many contrasts of heroic self-sacrifice, and which
was adorned witli exhibitions of moral courage and devotion
such as the world had seldom seen.

But of this social and mo al contradiction in our war for
independence, some explanation may be offered. It may, in
some measure, be found in three facts : first, that a distrust of
the national currency prevailed in the country ; secondly, that
the initiative (for it is the first steps in speculation which are
more responsible) was made by Jews and foreign adventurers
who everywhere infested the Confederacy ; and thirdly, that
the fever of gain was greatly inflamed by the corruptions of
the government, the abuse of its pecuniary patronage, and a
system of secret contract, in which oflficials who were dishon-
est shared the profits, and those who were incompetent were
easily overreached in the negotiation. The only serious blot
which defaced our struggle for independence was, at least to
some extent, the creature of circumstances ; and that is lost to
the eye of humane and enlightened history in the lustre of
arms and virtues shed on the South in the most sublime trials
of the war.

238 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

CHAPTER X.

Character of Military Events of the Springs of 1863. — Repulse of the Enemy at Fort
McAllister. — Thk Siege of Vicksbuko. — The Yazoo Pass Expedition. — Confederate
Success at Fort Pemberton. — The Enemy's Canals, or "Cut-offs." — Their Failure. —
BoMBART)MENT OF PoRT HuDsoN. — Dcstmction of "The Mississippi." — A Funeral
Pyre. — Happy Effects of our Victory, — A Review of the line of inland Hostilities.^
Hooker's hesitation on the Eappahannock. — The Assignment of Confederate com-
mands west of the Mississippi. — The Affair of Kelly's Ford. — Death of Major Pel-
ham. — Naval Attack on Charleston. — Destruction of " The Keokuk." — Scenery of
the Bombardment. — Extent of the Confederate Sucees.s. — Events in Tennessee and
Kentucky. — Pegram's Eeverse. — The Situation of Hostilities at the close of April, 1862.

Although but little is to be found of a decisive character in
the military events of the Spring of 1862, there was yet a series
of interesting occurrences which went far to prove the ineffi-
ciency of the most boasted naval structures of the enemy, and
the progress we had made in defensive works on the lines of
our harbors and the banks of our rivers.

The first of these may be mentioned as the repulse of the
enemy at Fort McAllister on the 3d of March. Tliis fort is on
the outer line of the defences of Savannah. Off the Georgia
coast, and eighteen miles to the southward of the Savannah
river, is Ossabaw sound. Into this sound flows the Ogechee
river, a stream navigable some distance up — some thirty miles
— to vessels of a larger class. On the Ogechee river, four
miles above the sound, is situate Fort McAllister. The fort
stands on the mainland, directly on the river bank, and com-
mands the river for a mile and a half or two miles.

The attack of the enemy on this fort yvas made with three
iron-clads and two mortar-boats. The result of a whole day's
bombardment was, that one gun was dismounted, but the fort
remained uninjured, and no loss of life was sustained on our
side. The iron-clad Montauk was struck with solid shot
B;venty-one times, and was lifted clear out of the water by
the explosion of a torpedo under her bow, but the Yankees
stated that she was not seriously injured. Indeed, they de-
clared that the whole affair was nothing more than an experi-
menticm crttcis, to ascertain the power of their new iron-clada

TH-E SECOND YP'AR OF THE "WAR. 239

to resist cannon-shot, and that the result of the encounter was
all that thej had hoped. If the enemy was pleased with the
result, the Confederates had certainly no reason to dispute his
satisfaction, as long as they had the solid gratification of hav-
ing resisted a bombardment of eight hours, without injury to
their works or the loss of a single life.

While the enemy menaced the seaboard, he had found an-
other theatre for his naval power on the waters of the Missis-
sippi river. His operations there were even more important
than those on our sea lines, for they were an essential part of
the campaign in the West. In fact, Vicksburg was for a long
time the point on which depended the movements in Tennes-
see and the resolution of the great crisis in the West.

THE SIEGE OF VICKSBURG.

The siege of Vicksburg furnishes a most remarkable in-
stance of the industry and physical perseverance of the Yan-
kees. Ever since December, 1862, they had been busily en-
gaged in the attempt to circumvent our defences, even to the
extremity of forcing our internal navigation of swampy la-
goons and obstructed creeks for a distance of four hundred and
fifty miles.

The enemy's operations in other directions kept him quiet
directly in front of Vicksburg, but his purpose was all the
same — the capture and occupation of the place. The enemy
had three distinct projects for compassing the capture of
Yicksburg : First, the canal across the isthmus opposite the
city; secondly, the project of getting through the Yazoo
Pass ; third, the Lake Providence canal project. It had been
all the time the principal aim of the Yankees to get in the
rear or below Yicksburg. Their present plan, and one on
which they were now at work, was to get through the Yazoo
Pass, in the hope of getting in our rear and cutting off our
supplies. Their idea was to flank Yicksburg, capture Jack-
son, cut off Grenada, and destroy all possibility of our ob-
taining supplies throughout that rich country, by this one bold
stroke.

The route mapped out by the Yankees commences near
Helena, Arkansas, where the Yazoo Pass connects the Mis

240 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

sissippi with the Cold water river, througli Moon lake. The
distance from the Mississippi to the Coldwater, bj this pass, is
about twenty miles — a very narrow and tortuous channel, only
navigable when the Mississippi is quite high and its waters
overflow the low lands of tliis region. The Coldwater river
empties into the Tallahatchie, and the Tallahatchie into the
Yazoo. The whole distance by this route from the Mississippi
to the mouth of the Yazoo, in the neighborhood of Yicks-
burg, is some five hundred miles, and over one-half of it, or
to the mouth of the Tallahatchie, it is easily obstructed. The
Yankees met with no obstruction on their ascent of the Talla-
hatchie, except the overgrowth and tortuousness of the stream
— which prevented the gunboats, in some instances, from mak-
ing more than three and four miles a day — until reaching the
mouth of the Tallahatchie, or its neighborhood, where they
encountered the batteries known as Fort Pemberton, which
stood as the barrier against the entrance of their fleet into the
Yazoo rivei', formed by the confluence of the Tallahatchie and
Yalabusha rivers.

This fort was nothing more than an indented line of earth-
works, composed of cotton bales and mud, thrown up on the
neck of a bend of the Tallahatchie river, where the river was
only two hundred and fifty yards wide. The site was selected
by Major-gen. Loring as the best position on the Yazoo or
Tallahatchie river.

It was here, on the 13th of March, that tlie Yazoo expedi-
tion was intercepted and driven back by our batteries, which
achieved a splendid victory over the Yankee gunboats. The
Yalabusha river unites with the Tallahatchie in the bend,
forming the Yazoo, so that the right flank of our works rest-
ed upon the Tallahatchie, and the left upon the Yazoo, both,
however, being really the same stream. The left flank was
opposite Greenwood, which is situated on the east side of
the Yazoo. The Tallahatchie, under the guns of the fort, was
obstructed by an immense raft, behind which the Star of the
"West was sunk in the channel. The intervention of the point
above the bend masked the whole of our line except the left,
upon which, consequently, the fire of the enemy's boats was
directed. The fire was terrific, uninterrupted for four hours,
from ten to sixteen heavy calibre guns on gunboats, two heavy

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR. 241

gims on land and one mortar. Yet the line of our batteries
was maintained. The loss of the enemy in this nnsnccessful
attack is not known ; but his gunboats and batteries were con-
stantly hit, and large quantities of burning cotton were struck
from them.

The defeat of the enemy at Fort Pemberton prevented his
fleet from passing by to the lower Yazoo. But tin's was not
the only canal project of the Yankees. One at Lake Provi-
dence, was intended to afford a passage from the Mississippi
to the head-waters of the Red river, by which they might com-
ijiand a vast scojie of country and immense resources. This
canal, which it was said was to change the bed of the Missis-
sippi and turn its mighty current in the Atchafalaya river oni
its way to the Gulf of Mexico, was also a failure. The canal
had been opened, and an enormous extent of country sub-
merged and ruined, but it was found that no gunboavs or
transports could ever reach the Mississippi below Yicksburg
by that route. Snags and drift choked up the tortuous
streams formed by the flood from the cut levees, and even ii
navigation had been possible, the channel might have been
rendered impassable in a hundred places by a score of active
guerrillas.

In the mean time, there was every reason to believe that the
Yankees were content to abandon the project of cutting a
ditch through the mainland opposite Yicksburg, b^- which it
was hoped to force the current of the Mississippi into an un-
accustomed course, through which to pass their vessels without
going within range of our batteries.

It was thus that the enemy was apparently brought to the
point of necessity of either attacking our fortifications at Sny-
der's Bluff on the Yazoo, or our batteries in front of the city.
These were the only two points left against wliich he could
operate, and they were the same which he had been trying to
avoid for the last three months. When he first arrived, these
were the only points susceptible of assault, but wishing to
flank them, he had wasted three months' time, lost a number of
gunboats and transports, and many thousands of his troops.

An attack directly in front of the city plainly threatened
the most serious disaster to the enemy. From a point of the
river above, where high land begins, there is a high and pre-

16

242 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAK.

cipitous bluff, which would not afford any landing-place for the
troops — only about two acres of ground are to be found where
a landing could be effected, and upon this a formidable battery
was ready to receive them, and in the rear there were number-
less other batteries to protect it. The whole bluff, extending
a distance of two miles, was also frowning' with guns, all of
which would bear upon an enemy in the river.

The expedition of the enemy on the Tallahatchie, which
met such unexpected and disgraceful defeat from the guns of
a hastily made fort, is memorable as another of those Yankee
raids which, unable to accomplish military results, was left to
gratify itself with the plunder of citizens and the cowardly
atrocities of marauders. From the barbarity of the Yankee,
Mississippi was a distinguished sufferer as well as Virginia.
Two-thirds of Sherman's army was composed of new troops
from Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin, and they had come
down the Mississippi with the intention of burning and de-
stroying every thing they could lay their hands on. The whole
line of their march was one continued scene of destruction.
Private dwellings were burned, women and children driven out
of their houses, and even the clothes stripped from their backs,
to say nothing of acts committed by the soldiery which might
make the blackest-hearted libertine blush for shame.*

Another attempt of the enemy to force our strongholds on
the Mississippi, which we have to relate at this time, was made

* The following is a private confession taken from the letter of a Yankee
officer, attached to Sherman's command : " I have always blamed Union gen-
erals for guarding rebel property, but I now see the necessity of it. Three weeks
of such unbridled license would ruin our army. I tell you the truth when I
say we are about as mean a mob as ever walked the face of the earth. It ia
perfectly frightful. If I lived m this country, I never would lay down my arms
while a ' Yajakee' remained on the soil. I do not blame Southerners for being
secessionists now, I could relate many things that would be laughable if they
were not so horribly disgraceful. For instance, imagine two privates in an
elegant carriage, belonging to some wealthy Southern nabob, with a splendid
span of horses riding in state along the road we are marching over, with a
negro coachmaji holding the reins in all the style of an English nobleman,
and then two small drummer-boys going it at a two-forty pace, in an elegant
buggy, with a fast horse, and the buggy loaded with a strange medley of house-
hold furniture and kitchen utensils, from an elegant parlor mirror to a pair of
fire-dogs, all of wMch they have ' cramped' from some fine house, which, from
sheer wantonness, they had rifled and destroyed."

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 243

on Port Iladson on the 15rli of March. We have seen how
fatal, so far, had been the enemy's attempts to run our batter-
ies and to get to the south of Vicksburg. His first attempt
was Mith the Queen of the West, his second with the Indianola;
but though successful in these two cases in running our batter-
ies, the boats were soon captured by our men, and the enemy
completely foiled in his design. It was now proposed that the
enemy's fleet should attack Port Hudson and attempt to force
a passage up the river.

THE BOMBARDMENT OF PORT HUDSON.

Port Hudson is a strongly fortified position on the lower
Mississippi — about sixteen miles above Baton Rouge and
three hundred below Vicksburg. It is situated on a bend in
the river, and its great strength as a place of defence against
a fleet consists in the height of its cliffs and the peculiar for-
mation of the river at that place. The cliffs are very high,
and also very steep — in fact, almost perpendicular. The river,
just at the bend opposite the town, suddenly narrows, so that
the rapid current strikes against the west bank, and then
sweeps through a narrow channel just at the base of the cliff.
Our batteries were located on a bluff at the elbow of the river,
and commanded a range of three miles above and below, com-
pelling any vessel which might attempt the passage to run the
gauntlet of a plunging fire.

Six vessels were to comprise the enemy's expedition, divided
into two divisions. The vanguard was to consist of the flag-
ship Hartford, a first-class steam sloop-of-war, carrying twenty-
six eight and nine inch Paixhan guns, leading, followed by the
Monongahela, a second-class steam sloop, mounting sixteen
heavy guns, and the Richmond, a first-class steam sloop of
twenty-six guns, principally eight and nine inch columbiads.
The rear-guard was composed of the first-ckss steam sloop
Mississippi, twenty-two guns, eight and nine inch, and the
gunboats Kinnes and Genesee, each carrying three columbiads
and two rifled thirty-two pounders. The Mississippi was a
side-wheel steamer. All the others were screw propellers.
The vanguard was commanded by Admiral Farragut in per-
son, on board the Hartford. The rear was under eommand of

244 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

Captain Melancthon Smith, flying his pennant from the Missis-
sippi. They were to proceed up the stream in a single file, the
stern of the one following close upon the stern of another, and
keeping their fires and lights well concealed until they should
be discovered by our batteries, when they were to get by the
best they could, fighting their passage ; and once above, they
believed they would have the stronghold on both sides, their
guns covering every part of the encampment.

Shortly before midnight, the boats having formed the line of
battle as described, their decks cleared for action, and the men
at their quarters, the Hartford led the way and the others
promptly followed her direction. At the moment of their dis-
covery, a rocket was to be sent np from the admiral's flag-ship,
as the signal for the Essex and her accompanying mortar-boats
to commence work.

Although there had been no indications of such a determined
night attack by Farragut, the usual vigilant precautions were
in force at our batteries. Every gun was ready for action,
and around each piece slept a detachment of gunners. So
dark was the night, however, and so slightly had the armed
craft nosed their way up, that the flag-ship had passed some oi
our guns, and all the fleet were within easy range before their
approach was known. Almost at the same time a I'ocket from
our signal corps, and the discharge of muskets by an infantry
picket, aroused our line. Quick as a flash, while the falling
fire of our alarm rocket was yet unextinguished, there shot
up into the sky, from the Hartford's deck, another. Then came
one grand, long, deafening roar, that rent the atmosphere with
its mighty thunder, shaking both land and water, and causing
the high battery-crowned clififs to tremble, as if with fear and
wonder.

The darkness of the night gave extraordinary sublimity to
the scene of bombardment. The sheets of flame that poured
from the sides of the sloops at each discharge lit up nearly the
whole stretch of river, placing each craft in strong relief against
the black sky. On the long line of bluflF, the batteries, but a
moment before silent as the church-yard, now resounded to the
hurrying tread of men, while the quick, stern tones of command
were heard above the awful din, and the furtively glancing
rays of light from the battle-lanterns revealed the huge instru-

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 245

nients of death and destruction, and showed the half-covered
way to magazines.

Minute after minute passed away, and the fleet kept its un-
checked course up the stream. The feeling of its officers was
one of amazement at the silence of the batteries. The question
was seriously propounded, had not the Confederates deserted
them ? But only too soon did the enemy discover that we
were but waiting to bring their whole fleet irretrievably under
our guns before we went to work.

For fifteen minutes had they plied at their monster cannon,
and now they were commencing to relax from sheer vexation,
when a flash of light from the crest of a cliff lights the way
for a shell to go plunging through the Hartford's deck. This
was the monitor, and at once the enemy saw a cordon of vivid
light as long as their own.

Now commenced the battle in all its terrible earnestness.
Outnumbered in guns and outweighed in metal, our volleys
were as quickly repeated, and the majority of them unerring in
their aim. As soon as the enemy thus discovered our batter-
ies, they opened on them with grape and canister, which was
more accurately thrown than their shells, and threw clouds of
dirt upon the guns and gunners ; the shells went over them in
every conceivable direction except the right one.

The Hartford, a very fast ship, now made straight up the
river, making her best time, and trying to divert the aim of
our gunners by her incessant and deafening broadsides. She
soon outstripped the balance of the fleet. Shot after shot struck
her, riddling her through and through, but still she kept on
her way.

Every craft now looking out for itself and bound to make
.ts very best time to get by, the fleet lost its orderly line of
battle, and got so mixed up, it was difficult, and sometimes im-
possible to distinguish one from another. It was speedily ap-
parent to the enemy that the fire was a great deal hotter and
more destructive than had been expected, and the captains of
the two gunboats and of the Monongahela, doubtless resolved
quickly that it would be madness to attempt to run such a ter-
rific gauntlet of iron hail. "Whether the commanders of the
Kichmond and Mississippi had already arrived at the same de-
termination, or came to it soon after, is not known ; but they

246 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE W IR.

all, except the Hartford, undertook to put about and return
the way they came.

For this purpose the Richmond came close in to the left
bank, under the batteries, and then circled round, her course
reaching nearly up to the opposite point. In executing this
manoeuvre, she gave our batteries successively a raking posi-
tion, and they took excellent advantage of it, seriously damag-
ing her, as the crashing of her timbers plainly told.

The Mississippi undertook to execute the same manoeuvre, of
turning round and making her escape back to the point she
started from. She had rounded and just turned down" stream,
when one of our shots tore off her rudder, and another went
crushing through her machinery. Immediately after came the
rushing sound of steam escaping from some broken pipe, and
the now unmanageable vessel drifted aground directly opposite
our crescent line of batteries. Her range was quickly gained,
and she was being rapidly torn to pieces by our missiles, when
her commander gave the order for all hands to save themselves
the best way they could. At the same time fire broke out in
two places. At this time her decks were strewn with dead
and wounded. Some fifty-five or sixty persons saved them-
selves by jumping overboard and swimming to the shore.

The dead and wounded were left upon the Mississippi, which
soon floated off and started down with the current. All tlie
other vessels were now out of range, and the spectacle of the
burning ship was a grand and solemn one, yet mingled with
painful thoughts of the horrible fate of those mangled unfor-
tunates who were being burned to death upon this floating
funeral pyre. As the flames would reach the shells lying
among her guns, they exploded one by one, adding to the
novel grandeur of the sight. The light of the burning wreck
could be seen, steadily increasing its distance, for two hours
and a half. At five minutes past five o'clock, when the Mis-
sissippi was probably within five miles of Baton Rouge, a sud-
den glare lit up the whole sky. The cause was well known to
be the explosion of the magazine. After a considerable inter-
val of time, a long rumbling sound brought final proof that
the Mississippi, one of the finest vessels of the United States
navy, which had earned an historical fame before the com-
mencement of the present war, for her usefulness in the Gull

THE SECOND YEAR OF TUE WAR. 247

during the Mexican war, and as the flag-ship of the Japan ex-
pedition, was a thing of the past.

The victory of Port Hudson forms one of the most satisfac-
tory and brilliant pages in the liistory of the war. The fleet,
with the exception of the Hartford, had been driven back by
our batteries, and a grateful surprise had been given to nianj
of our people, who had acquired the disheartening conviction
that gunboats could treat shore batteries with contempt. So
far our strongholds on the Mississippi had bid defiance to the
foe. and months of costly preparation for their reduction had
been spent in vain.

"While these events were transpiring on the Mississippi, the
long line of inland hostilities remained unvaried and almost
silent. In Yirginia and in Tennessee, the powerful armies of
Lee and Hooker, Bragg and Rosecrans, had camped for months
in close proximity, without a cannonade, and almost without a
skirmish. To some extent the elements had proclaimed a
truce, while the hesitating temper of the enemy betrayed a
policy strangely at variance with the former vigorous campaign
in the same season of the last year. Especially was the hesi-
tation remarkable in Yirginia, where the new commander-in-
chief of the enemy — Hooker — was a violent member of the
Abolitionist party. He was the chief of that clique among
the Yankee otiicers who made the war, not to realize the dream
of a restored Union, but for the subjugation and destruction
of the Southern social system, the massacre or exile of the in-
habitants of the Southern country, and the confiscation of their
entire real and personal property.

Beyon^ the Mississippi there was scarcely any thing to re-
mark but a new assignment of military commands. We had
now west of the Mississippi Lieutenant-gen. Kirby Smith, Gen.
Price, Gen. Magruder, and Gen. Sibley. Gen. Smith had been
placed at the head of the department, and had already issued
an order announcing that fact; Gen. Price was assigned to
lead the field movements for the redemption of Arkansas and
his own State, Missouri; Gen. Sibley was moving to other im-
portant points; and Gen. Magruder's field of operations was
Texas.

We have to record but a single incident in the spring of
1863, to break the long silence of the lines of the Itappahan-

2-i8 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE.

nock. On the mornino; of the 17th of March the enemy cross-
ed the river at Kelly's ford, with both a cavalry and ai-tillerj
force, numbering probably three thousand men. They ad-
vanced within six miles of Culpepper Court-house, where they
were engaged by the brigade of Gen. Fitzhugh Lee. The
fio^ht was severe and lasted several hours. The Yankees were
finally repulsed, and fell back routed and panic-stricken, after
having inflicted a loss upon us of about one hundred in killed
and wounded. They had fought with some advantages at first,
bravely contesting their ground, and it is not improbable that
a report of reinforcements coming up to us was the occasion of
their retreat. When the retreat was ordered, they fled in
dismay and confusion.

This affair — if it was worth any thing — cost ns the life of
one of the most brilliant artillery officers in the army. Major
Pelham, of Alabama, who had acquired the title of " the gal-
lant Pelham" from the hands of Gen. Lee in the official report
of the battle of Fredericksburg, was killed by the fragment of
a shell. At Fredericksburg, he had distinguished himself by
sustaining the concentrated fire of a number of the enemy's
batteries. In that terrible trial he had stood as a rock. In
the affair which cost him his life, he had just risen in his sad-
dle to cheer a troop of cavalry rushing to the charge, when
the fatal blow was given. He was only twenty-two years of
age, and had been through all the battles in Yirginia. Un-
usual honors were paid his remains, for they were laid in the
capitol, and tributes of rare flowers strewn upon the bier of
" the young Marcellus of the South."

NAVAL ATTACK ON CHARLESTON. «

The city of Charleston had long been the object of the
enemy's lust ; it was considered a prize scarcely less important
than the long-contested one of Richmond; and with more than
their customary assurance, the Yankees anticipated the glory
and counted the triumphs of the capture of the cradle of the
revolution. It was thought to be* an easy matter for Admiral
Dupont's iron-clad fleet to take the city, and the Yankee news-
papers for months had indulged the prospect of the capture oi
Charleston as a thing of the future that only awaited their
pleasure.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE "WAR. 249

On Sunday morning, the 5tli of April, four " monitors," the
Ironsides (an armor-plated fi'igate with an armament of twenty-
two 10, 11, and 15-inch guns), and thirty vessels of vai'ions
sizes, were seen off the bar. Fonr monitors and thirty-five
wooden vessels were added to the fleet on the foUowino- dav :
thirty-five vessels, for the most part trans]iorts, appeared in
the Stono, and the enemy landed a force of about six thousand
men on Coles' and Battery Islands. These facts, with other
indications, led Gen. Beauregard to count upon an attack vn
Tuesday, and the expectations of that sagacious and vigilant
commander were not disappointed.

The atmosphere early on Tuesday morning, 7th of April,
was misty, but as the day advanced, the haze lightened, and
the monitors and the Ironsides were seen lying off Morris
Island. Between two and three o'clock in the afternoon, a dis-
patch from Col. Rhett, commandant of Fort Sumter, informed
Gen. Beauregard that five monitors and the Ironsides were ap-
proaching the fort. The fleet were seen rounding the point of
Morris Island, the Keokuk in the advance. It was K happy
moment for the defenders of Charleston. So long; had sus-
pense reigned in that city, that the booming of the signal gun
and the announcement that at last the battle had begun was a
positive relief. A thrill of joy came to every heart, and the
countenances of all declared plainly that a signal victory over
the mailed vessels was reckoned upon without doubt or mis-
giving. The long-roll beat in Fort Sumter; the artillerists
in that work rushed to their guns. The regimental flag of the
1st South Carolina Artillery, and " the stars and bars" of the
Confederate States, flaunted out from their flagstaffs on the
fort, and were saluted as ,the enemy advanced with an out-
burst of "Dixie" from the band and the deep-mouthed roar of
thirteen pieces of heavy artfllery.

On came the mailed monitors. Their ports were closed, and
they appeared deserted of all living things. They moved
northwardly towards Sullivan's Island, and at a distance from
its batteries of about 1,200 yards they began to curve around
towards Sumter. A flash, a cloud of smoke, a clap of thunder,
herald a storm of heavy shot, which bursts from the island
upon the side of the frigate. The ships move on silently. The
deep-mouthed explosions of Sumter in the next instant burst

250 THE SECOND YRAR OF THE WAR.

upon the advancing ships, and hurl tremendous bolts of
wrought iron against the armor of the Ironsides. The frigate
halts. At a distance of about twelve hundred yards from that
work she delivers from seven guns a broadside of 15-inch shot,
that dashes against the sea-face of Sumter with a heavy crash.
Bricks fly from the parapet and whirl from the traverse. A
shell smashes a marble lintel in the officers' quarters, hustles
through a window on the other side, and, striking the parapet,
hurls a tornado of l)ricks far to the rear. The works on Morris
Island burst into the deafening chorus — on land and on sea,
from all the batteries of the outer circle, from all the turrets of
the iimer circle.

It Avas manifest that the Ironsides was appointed to test the
strength of tiie fort. Fort Sumter acknowledged the compli-
ment by pouring the contents of her biggest guns into that
pride of the Yankee navy. Advancing on her circling course,
the Ironsides made way for her attendant M'arriors ; and one by
one, as their turrets moved in the solemn waltz, they received
the fire, sometimes diffused, sometimes concentrated, of the
surrounding circle of batteries. The first division of the ships
curved on its path under an iron storm that rended the air with
its roar, and burst upon their mail in a quick succession of
reports ; sometimes with the heavy groan of crushing, some-
times with the sharp cry of tearing. Delivering a fire of shot
and shell as they passed the works on Morris Island, the Iron-
sides and her monitors moved slowly out of range. As the
Ironsides withdrew from the action, taking position to the south
of Fort Sumter, steam w-as seen issuing from her in dense vol-
umes, and it was believed that she was seriously damaged.

The Keokuk, a double-turreted iron-clad, led into the fight
four monitors. More bold than even the Ironsides, she advanced
under a tornado of shot to a position within about nine hundred
yards of Font Sumter. Halting at that distance, she discharged
her 15-inch balls from her turrets against the sea-face of that
fort. Crushing and scattering the bricks on the line of her
tremendous fire, she failed, however, to make any serious im-
pression on the walls. A circle of angry flashes radiated to-
wards her from all sides, while a tempest of iron bolts and
round-shot crashed against her sides. For about twenty min-
utes she stood still, in apparent helplessness. At the expiration

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 251

of tliat time she moved slowly on, and after receiving the fire
of the works on Morris Island, passed out of range. She was
fairly riddled, for she had been the target of the most powerful
guns the Confederates could command. Great holes were visi-
ble in her sides, her prow, her after-turret, and her smoke-
stack. Her plates M'ere bent and bolts protruded here and
there all over her. She was making water rapidly, and it was
plain to see that she was a doomed ship.

After the Keokuk and her companions had passed out of
range, the circular movement was not renewed. The ships
retired outside the harbor to their anchorage ; and after about
two hours and a half of a most terrible storm of shot and thun-
der of artillery, Fort Sumter and its supporting batteries set-
tled down under sluggish clouds of smoke into triumphs of
quiet.

Our victory was one of unexpected brilliancy, and had cost
lis scarcely more than the ammunition for our guns. A drum-
mer boy was killed at Fort Sumter and five men wounded.
Our artillery practice w^as excellent, as is proved by the fact
that the nine Yankee vessels were struck five hundred and
twenty times. The Keokuk received no less than ninety shots.
She did not outlive the attack on Fort Sumter twelve hours.
The next day her smoke-stack and one of her turrets wei-e
visible during low water off Morris Island, where she had
sunk.

The battle had been fought on the extreme outer line of fire,
and the enemy had been defeated at the very threshold of our
defences. Whether his attack was intended only as a recon-
noissance, or whether what was supposed to be the preliminary
skirmish was in fact the whole affair, it is certain that our suc-
cess gave great assurances of the safety of Charleston ; that it
had the proportions of a considerable victory; and that it went
far to impeach the once dreaded power of the iron-clads of the
enemy.*

* It is a question of scientific interest whether, in the construction of iron-
clads, the Confederate plan of slanted sides is not superior to the Yankee plan
of thick-walled turrets — the Virginia-Merrimac, and not the Monitor, the true
model. The Yankee monitor is an upright, cylindrical turret. If a shot strikes
the centre line of this cylinder, it will not glance, but deliver its full force. On
the contrary, the peculiarity of the Virginia-Merrimac was its roof-shaped sides.

252 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR.

The montli of April has but few events of military note be-
yond what has been referred to in the foregoing pages. The
' check of Van Dorn at Franklin, Tennessee, and the reverse of
Pegram in Kentucky, were unimportant incidents ; they did
not affect the campaign, and their immediate disasters were
inconsiderable. The raid of the latter commander into Ken-
tucky, again revived reports of the reaction of public sentiment
in that unhappy State in favor»of the Confederacy. It was on
his retreat that he was set upon by a superior force of the en-
emy near Somerset, from which he effected an escape across
the Cumberland, after the loss of about one hundred and fifty
men in killed, wounded, and prisoners.

This period, properly the close of the second year of hostili-
ties, presents a striking contrast with the corresponding month
of the former year with respect to the paramount aspects of
the war. In April, 1862, the Confederates had fallen back in
Virginia from the Potomac beyond the Rappahannock, and
were on the point of receding from the vicinity of the lower
Chesapeake before the advancing army of McClellan. Now
they confronted the enemy from the Rappahannock and hov-
ered upon his flank within striking distance to the Potomac,
while another portion of our forces manoeuvred almost in the
rear and quite upon the flank of Norfolk. Twelve months ago
the enemy threatened the important Southern artery which
links the coast of the Carolinas with Virginia ; he was master
of Florida, both on the Atlantic and the Gulf; and Mobile
trembled at every blast from the Federal bugles of Pensacola.
Now his North Carolina lines were held exclusively as lines of
occupation ; he was repulsed on the seaboard ; his operations
in Florida were limited to skirmishing parties of negroes ; and
Mobile had become the nursery of cruisers in the very face of
his blockading squadron. A year ago the grasp of the enemy

on wliich the shot glances. The inventor of that noble naval structure. Com-
mander Brooke, claimed the slanted or roof-shaped sides as constituting the
original feature and most important merit of his invention. We may add now
that to the genius of this accomplished officer the Confederacy was variously
indebted ; for it was a gun of his invention — " the Brooke gun" — that fired the
bolt which pierced the turret of the Keokuk, and gave the first proof in the
war that no thickness of iron, that is practical in the construction of such a
macliine, is sufficient to secure it.

THE SECOND YKAK OF THE WAR. 253

was closing on the Mississippi from Cairo to the Gnlf; but
while Butler was enjoying his despotic amusements and build-
ing up his private fortunes in the Crescent City, the strong-
holds of Yicksburg and Port Hudson were created, and held
at bay the most splendid expeditions which the extravagance of
the North had yet prepared. A year ago the enemy, by his
successes in Kentucky and Tennessee, held the way almost into
the very heart of the Confederacy, through Eastern Tennessee
and Western Virginia. Now the fortunes of the war in that
whole region were staked upon the issues of impending battle.
For three months the "grand hesitation" of the North had
continued. "With some seven or eight hundred thousand sol-
diers in the field and countless cruisers swarming on our coasts,
the enemy had yet granted us a virtual suspension of arms
since the great battles of Fredericksburg and Murfreesboro',
interrupted only by petty engagements and irresolute and fruit-
less bombardments. He had shown that he possessed no real
confidence in the success of his arms ; he had so far failed to
reduce any one of " the three great strongholds of the rebel-
lion," Richmond, Charleston, and Yicksburg; and he had ceased
to map out those plans of conquest of which he was formerly
so prolific.

254 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

CHAPTER XI.

Close of the Second Year of the War. Propriety of an Outline of some succeed-

\ng Events. — Cavalry Enterprises of the Enemy. — The raids in Mississippi and Vir-
ginia.— Sketch of the Battles of tub Rappahannock. — The Enemy's Plan of Attack.
— The Fight at Chancellorsville. — The Splendid Cliarcje of " Stonewall" Jackson. —
The Fight at Fredericksburg. — The Figlit at Salem Church. — Summary of our Victory.
— Dkath of " Stonevtall" Jackson. — His Character and Services.

The second year of the war, having commenced with the
fall of New Orleans, 1st of May, 1862, properly closes with
the events recorded in the preceding chapter. Of succeeding
events, which have occurred between this period and that of
publication, we do not propose to attempt at this tiine a full
narrative; their detail belongs to anotlier volume. It is pro-
posed at present only to make an outline of them, so as to
give to the reader a stand-point of intelligent observation,
from which he ma}'^ survey the general situation at the time
these pages are given to the public.

The next volume of our history will open on that series of
remarkable raids and enterprises on the part of tl>e enemy's
cavalry, which, in the months of April and May, disturbed
many parts of the Confederacy. We shall find that the ex-
tent of these raids of Yankee horsemen, their simultaneous
occurrence in widely removed parts of the Confederacy, and
the circumstances of each, betrayed a deliberate and extensive
purposfe on the part of the enemy and a consistency of design
deserving the most serious consideration.

"We shall relate how the people of Richmond were alarmed
by the apparition of Yankee cavalry near their homes. But
we shall find causes of congratulation that the unduly famous
expedition of Stoneman was not more destructive. The dam-
age which it inflicted upon our railroads was slight, its hurried
pillage did not amount to much, and the only considerable
capture it effected was a train of commissary wagons in King
William county.

Other parts of the Confederacy, visited about the same time

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 255

by Yankee cavalry, were not so fortunate. Tlie State of Mis-
sissippi was ransacked almost tlirongh its entire length by the
Grierson raid. Starting from Coi'inth, near the northern
boundary of Mississippi, a body of Yankee horsemen, cer-
tainly not exceeding two thousand, rode down the valley of
the Tombigbee, penetrated to a point below the centre of the
State, and then making a detour, reached the Mississippi Gulf
coast in safety. This force, so insignificant in numbers, made
the entire passage of the State of Mississippi, from the north-
east to the southwest corner ; and the important town of En-
terprise was barely saved by reinforcements of infantry which
arrived from Meridian just fifteen minutes before the Yankees
demanded the surrender of the place.

We shall have to add here cotemporary accounts of another
Yankee raid in Georgia. That adventure, however, was hap-
pily nipped in the bud by Forrest, who captured the Yankee
commander, Stuart, and his entire party, at Eome, Georgia,
after one of the most vigorous pursuits ever made of an enemy.

The interest of these raids was something more than that of
the excursions of brigands. That of Stoneman was an im-
portant part of the great battle which signalized the opening
of the month of May on the banks of the Rappahannock, and
broke at last the " grand hesitation'' of the enemy, which had
been the subject of so much impatience in the South.

SKETCH OF THE BATTLES OF THE RAPPAHANNOCK.

The plan of attack adopted by Gen. Hooker may be briefly
characterized as a feint on our right, and a flank movement in
force on our left. It was determined to throw a heavy force
across the river just below the mouth of Deep Run, and three
miles below Fredericksburg, and pretend to renew the attempt
in which Burnside had previously been unsuccessful. The ob-
ject of this movement was two-fold — first, to hold the Confed-
erate forces at that point ; and second, to protect Hooker's
communications and supplies, while the other half of the army
should make a crossing above the fortifications, and sweeping
down rapidly to the rear of Fredericksburg, take a strong po-
sition and hold it until they could be reinforced by the portion
of the army engaged in making the feint, which was to witli-

256 THE SECOND TEAK OF TIIK WAR.

draw from its position, take the bridges to the point of the
river M'hich had been nncovered by the flank movement, and
tlie whole army was thus to be concentrated in the rear of
Fredericksburg.

The execution of this plan was commenced on Monday, the
26tli of April. Three corps cCarmee — the Fifth, Eleventh, and
Twelfth — were ordered to march up the river with eight days'
rations to Kelly's ford, on the north bank of the Rappahan-
nock, near the Orange and Alexandria railroad. This force,
under the command of Gen. Slocum, of the Twelfth coi'ps,
reached the point at which it was to cross the Rappahannock
on Tuesday night. On the same night three other corps — the
First, Third, and Sixth — were sent to the month of Deep Run,
three miles below Fredericksburg, to be ready to undertake
the crossing simultaneously with the other corps at Kelly's
ford on Wednesday morning, before day. The movement
was successfully conducted at both points, and without serious
opposition from the Confederates.

The Second corps, under Couch, which had remained at
Banks' ford, four miles above the toWn, was moved up to the
United States ford, just below the point of confluence of the
Rappahannock and Rapidan, and crossed to join Gen. Slocum,
who had crossed the Rappahannock several miles higher up at
Kelly's ford, and the Rapidan at Germania Mills and Ely's
ford, and marched down to Chancellorsville. These move-
ments occupied AVednesday and Thui-sday. Hooker now as-
sumed command of the right wing of his army. He took his
position across the plank-road and turnpike at Chancellorsville,
eleven miles from Fredericksburg, in order to cut off our an-
ticipated retreat in the direction of Gordonsville, and strength-
ened his naturally formidable position by a series of elaborate
abatis and tield-works.

The North eagerly seized upon the different circumstances
of the existing situation as indicative of victory. Gen. Hooker
had made himself conspicuous in the eyes of the Yankees.
He was confldent, when examined before the Congressional
Committee on the conduct of the war, that he could have
marched into Richmond at any time at his ease had he been
at the head of the Army of the Potomac instead of Gen.
McClellan ; and if he had had command instead of Burnside,

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 257

he would have achieved wonders. He had recently stated
that the army he led was "the iinest on the planet," '"an army
of veterans," as the Tribune remarked, " superior to that of the
Peninsula ;" and so large was it that Northern journals as-
serted that Hooker had more troops than he knew what to do
with. Nor was this all. He was allowed by Lee to cross the
Rappahannock, without opposition and without loss, and to se-
cure a position deemed impregnable — one which, according to
the order lie issued on Thursday the 30th of April, had ren-
dered it necessary that " the enemy must either ingloriously
fly, or come out from behind his defences and give us (the Yan-
kee army) battle on our own ground, where certain destruction^
waits him."

In the mean time, Gen. Lee was not slow to meet the dispo-
sitions of his adversary. The enemy continued tA pour across
the river at Deep Kun, until three entire corps, numbering be-
tween iifty and sixty thousand men under Gen. Sedgwiclqll'ihad
crossed to the south side./^Lee calmly watched tii3s movement,
as well as the one higher up the river under Hooker, until he
had penetrated the enemy^s design, and seen the necessity of
making a rapid division of his own forces, to confront him on
two different fields, and risking the result of lighting him in
detail.

About noon on Wednesday, the 29th, information was re-
ceived that the enemy had crossed the Rappahannock in force
at Kelly's and Ellis' fords above, and were passing forward
towards German^ Mills and Ely's ford on the Rapidan. Two
brigades of Anderson's division, Posey's Mississippians, and
Mahone's Virginians, numbering about 8,000 men, and one
battery of four guns, were, and had been for several weeks,
stationed in the neighborhood of Ely's ford on the Rapidan,
and United States ford on the Rappahannock, guarding the
approaches to Fredericksburg in that direction. It was appa-
rent that this small force would be entirely inadequate to ar-
rest the approach of Hooker's heavy column, and Wright's
brigade was ordered up to their support. At daylight on
Thursday morning, the head of Wright's brigade reached
Chancellorsville, at wdiich point Posey and Mahone had con-
centrated their forces with a view of making a stand. Major-
gen. Anderson having also arrived in the latter part of the

17

258 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE.

night, and having obtained further information of the number
of the Yankee forces, upon consultation with his brigade com-
manders, determined to fall back from Chancellorsville in the
direction of Fredericksburg, live miles, to a point where the
Old Mine road, leading from the United States ford, crosses
the Orange and Fredericksburg turnpike and plank-road.
The turnpike and plank-road were parallel to each other
from Chancellorsville to the point where the Old Mine road
crosses them, and from there to Fredericksburg they make one
road.

Chancellorsville is eleven miles above Fredericksburg, and
about four miles south of the point of confluence of the Rapi-
dan with the E-appahannock, and consists of a large two-storj
brick house, formerly kept as a tavern, and a few out-houses.
It is situated on the plank-road leading from Fredericksburg
to Orange Court-house, and is easily approached by roads
leading from Germaim Mills, and Ely's, United States, and
Banks' fords. Between Chancellorsville and the river and
above lies the Wilderness, a district of country formerly
L- covered with a scrubby black-jac^^aks, and a thick, tangled
under-growth, but now somewhat cleared up. The ground
around Chancellorsville is heavily timbered, and favorable for
defence. Seven miles from Chancellorsville, on the road to
Fredericksburg, and four miles from the latter place, is Salem
Church.

During the night of Thursday, Gen. Lee ordered Jackson to
march from his camp below Fredericksburg, with A. P. Hill's
a.nd Rhodes' (formerly D. H. Hill's) division, to the relief of
Anderson. Gen. Lee brought up the divisions of Anderson
and McLaws. He occupied the attention of the enemy in
front, while Gen. Jackson, with the divisions of Hill, Rhodes,
and Trimble, moved by the road that leads from the Mine
road, behind the line-of-battle, to the road that leads to Ger-
many ford. This movement of General Jackson occupied
nearly the whole of Saturday, May 2d, so that he did not get
into position at the Wilderness Church until near sunset of
that day.

While Jackson was gaining the enemy's rear, McLaws and
Anderson had successfully maintained their position in front.
Hooker had been felicitating himself upon his supposed good

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 259

fortune in gaining our rear. "What must have been his sur-
prise, then, to find Stonewall Jackson on his extreme right and
rear. Jackson's assault was sudden and furious. In a short
time he threw Siegel's corps (the 11th) of Dutchmen into a
perfect panic, and was' driving the whole right wing of the
Yankee army fiercely down upon Anderson's and McLaw's
sturdy veterans, who, in turn, hurled them back, and rendered
futile their efiforts to break through our lower lines, and made
it necessary for them to give back towards the river.

There, ,was an intermission of about one hour in the firino^
from %Ji|^ipl^ until nine o'clock. It was at this time that Jack-
son received his death wound from his own men, who mistook
him for the enemy. Gen. Hill, upon whom the command now
devolved, was soon afterwards wounded also, when Gen. Rhodes
assumed command until Gen. Stuart could arrive upon that
part of the field. Sb&wart renewed the fight at nine o'clock,
night as it was, in accordance with Gen. Jackson's original
plan, and did not withhold his blows until the enemy's right had
been doubled in on his centre in and around Chancellorsville.

At dajdight Sunday morning, our army, which now sur-
rounded the enemy on all sides except towards the river, com-
menced advancing and closing in upon him from all points,
Tiie enemy had dug rifle-pits and cut abatis in front and along
his whole line, while his artillery, well protected by earth-
works, covered every eminence and swell of rising ground, so
as to get a direct and enfilading fire upon our advancing
columns. But on our gallant men moved, their ranks played
upon by an incessant fire of shell, grape, and canister, from the
front, the right, and left. On they pressed through the wood,
over the fields, up the hills, into the very mouths of the enemy's
guns°and the long line of rifle-pits. With a terrible shout they
sprang forward, and rushing through the tangled abatis, they
gained the bank in front of the rifle-pits, when the foe gave
way in great confusion and fled.

An extraordinary victory appeared to be in our grasp. The
capture or destruction of Hooker's army now appeared certain.

Gen. Lee, finding the enemy still in force towards the river,
ordered the army to form on the plank-road above Chancellors-
ville, extending his line in a southeasterly direction down the
turnpike below Chancellorsville, with his centre resting about

260 THE SKCOND YEAK OF THE "WAR.

the latter point. Just then, news was received that Sedgwick,
taking advantage of our weakness, had crossed the river at
Fi'edericksburg, driven Barksdale from the town, and occupied
Marye's hill, after capturing several pieces of the Washington
Artillery. It was also stated that Sedgwick was advancing up
the plank-road upon Lee's rear. This movement of the enemy-
was all that saved Hooker from destruction.

The story of the reverse at Fredericksburg is easily told.
Our forces in defence of the line, commencing at Marye's hill
and terminating at Hamilton's crossing, consisted of Gen.
Barksdale's brigade and Gen. Early's division. Gea. Barks-
dale held the extreme left. His line had its beginning at a
point two hundred yards north of Marye's heights, and ex-
tended a mile and a half to a point opposite the pontoon bridge
on the left of Mansfield. This brigade, on the morning of the
battle, did not exceed two thousand in numbers, rank and file,
and throughout the entire length of its line had no other sup-
port than six pieces of the Washington Artillery, which were
posted on Marye's heiglits, and Read's battery, which was
placed in position on the hill to the left of Howison's house.

Against this position the enemy brought to bear tlie com-
mand of Gibbins on the left flank, and about twenty thousand
of Sedgwick's corps. The first assault was made in front of
the stone wall, as in the case of last December, and was sig-
nally repulsed. This was repeated three times, and on each
occasion the handful of men behind the wall, with shouts of
enthusiasm and deadly volleys, drove back the assailants. The
first charge was made before sunrise, and the others in as rapid
succession as was possible after rallying and reinforcement.
About nine o'clock in the morning the enemy adopted the ruse
of requesting a flag of truce, for the alleged purpose of carry-
ing off the wounded, but for the real object of ascertaining our
force. The flag was granted, and thereby our insufficient de-
fence was exposed, the bearer coming up on the left flank from
a direction whence our whole line was visible. Immediately
after the conclusion of the truce, the enemy reinforced their
front, and threw the whole of Gibbins' division on our left, de-
fended by the 21st Mississippi regiment alone, commanded by
Col. B. J. Humphreys. This regiment faced the advancing
host without quailing, and, after firing until but a few feet in-

THE SECOND YKAK OF THE WAR. 261

tervened between them and the foe, they clubbed muskets and
Buccessfullj dashed back the front line of their assailants. The
enemy, by the f(5rce of overwhelming numbers, however, broke
through our line, and Marye's hill was flanked about eleven
o'clock Sunday morning.

The turn which events had taken in front of Fredericksburg
made it necessary for Gen. Lee to arrest the pursuit of Hooker,
and caused him to send back to Fredericksburg the divisions of
Anderson and McLaws to check the advance of Sedgwick.
Gen. McLaws moved down the plank-road to reinforce Barks-
dale and Wilcox, the latter of whom had been observing
Banks' ford, and who had been driven back to Salem Church.
McLaws reaching Salem Church in time to relieve Wilcox
from the pressure of overwhelming numbers, checked the ad-
vance of Sedgwick, and drove him back, with great loss to both
parties, until night closed the conflict.

The enemy, however, was not yet defeated. One more
struggle remained, and to make that the enemy during the
night massed a heavy force against McLaws' left in order to
establish communication with LTooker along the river road.
Anderson moved rapidly to the support of McLaws, and
reached the church about 12 m., having marched fifteen miles.
Gen. Lee having arrived on the field, ordered Anderson to
move round the church and establish his right on Early's left,
(Early having come up from Hamilton's crossing, in rear of
the enemy). The enemy having weakened his left in order to
force McLaws and gain the river road, Gen. Lee massed a
heavy force upon this weakened part of the enemy, and at a
concerted signal, Anderson and Early rushed upon the enemy's
left.

The signal for the general attack was not given until just
before sunset, when our men rushed upon the enemy like a
hurricane. But little resistance was made, the beaten foe hav-
ing fled in wild confusion in the direction of Banks' ford. At
dark a short pause ensued ; but as soon as the moon rose, the
enemy was speedily driven to Banks' ford, and on that night
of the 4th of May ended this remarkable series of battles on
the lines of the Rappahannock.

The enemy being driven from every point around Freder-
icksburg, Gen. Lee determined to make short work of Hookei

262 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE.

at United States ford. Therefore, Tuesday noon Anderson
was ordered to proceed iraraediatelj back to Chancellorsville,
while McLaws was instructed to take up his position in front
of United States ford, at or near the junction of the Old Mine
and River roads. But a drenching storm of wind and rain set
in and continued without cessation until Wednesday forenoon,
when it was discovered that Hooker, taking advantage of the
darkness and the storm, had also retreated across the river the
preceding night.

Our forces engaged in the fight did not exceed fifty thousand
men. The enemy's is variously estimated at from one hundred
thousand to one hundred and fifty thousand. Yet the greater
gallantry of our troops, even despite the emergency into which
their commander had brought them, enabled him not only to
beat this immense army, but to capture several thousand pris-
oners, thirty or forty thousand small-arms, several stands of
colors, and an immense amount of personal property, and to
kill and wound some twenty-five thousand men. It was a glo-
rious week's work.*

We have not at present those lights before us necessary for
a just criticism of the military aspects of these battles of the
Rappahannock. They were undoubtedly a great victory for
the Confederacy. But there were two remarkable misfortunes
which diminished it. The breaking of our lines at Fredericks-
burg withdrew pursuit from Hooker. When thereupon our

* The army wliich accomplished this work was, according to the Yankee de-
scription of it, a curiosity. Some of the military correspondence of the Yankee
journals was more candid than usual, and admitted a shameful defeat by the
" ragged rebels." One of these correspondents wrote :

"We had men enough, well enough equipped and well enough posted, to
have devoured the ragged, imperfectly armed and equipped host of our ene-
mies from off the face of the earth. Their artillery horses are poor, starved
frames of beasts, tied on to their carriages and caissons with odds and ends of
rope and strips of raw hide. Their supply and ammtmition trains look like a
congregation of all the crippled California emigrant trains that ever escaped
off the desert out of the clutches of the rampaging Camanche Indians. The
men are ill-dressed, ill-equipped, and ill-provided — a set of ragamuffins that a
man is ashamed to be seen among, even when he is a prisoner and can't help
it. And yet they ^ave beaten us fairly, beaten us all to pieces, beaten us so
easily that we are objects of contempt even to their commonest private soldiers,
with no shirts to hang out of the holes in their pantaloons, and cartridge-boxee
tied round their waists with strands of rope."

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 263

forces were turned upon Sedgwick, a second misfortune robbed
us of a complete success; for lie managed to secure bis retreat
by Banks' ford, whicb exit miglit possibly have been cut off,
and the exclusion of which would liave secured his surrender.
Of these events there is yet no official detail.

But a shadow greater than that of any partial misfortunes
on the field rested on the Confederate victory of Chancellors-
ville. It was the death of Gen. Jackson, This event is impor-
tant enough to require, even in tlie contracted limits of these
supplementary pages, a separate title and a notice apart from
our general narrative.

THE DEATH OF "STONEWALL" JACKSOK

It was about eight o'clock on Saturday evening, 2d of May,
when Gen. Jackson and his staff, M'ho were returning on the front
of our line of skirmishers, were fired upon by a regiment of his
own corps, who mistook the party for the enemy. At the time,
the general was only about fifty yards in advance of tlie enemy.
He had given orders to fire at any thing coming up the road,
before he left the lines. The enemy's skirmishers appeared
ahead of him and he turned to ride back. Just then some one
cried out, " Cavalry ! charge !" and immediately the regiment
fired. The whole party broke forward to ride through our line
to escape the fire. Captain Boswell was killed and carried
through the line by his horse, and fell amid our own men. The
general himelf was struck by three balls: one through the left
arm, two inches below the shoulder joint, shattering tlie bone
and severing the chief artery; another ball passed through the
same arm, between the elbow and wri^t, making its exit through
the palm of the hand ; a third ball entered the palm of the right
hand about its middle, and passing through, broke two of the
bones. As Gen. Jackson was being borne from the field, one
of the litter-bearers was shot down, and the general fell from
the shoulders of the men, receiving a severe contusion, adding
to the iiii'^".; of the arm, and injuring the side severely. The
ene'^:^ s fire of artillery on the point was terrible. Gen. Jack-
son was left for five minutes, until the fire slackened, then
placed in an ambulance and carried to the field hospital at

264: THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

Wilderness Run. He lost a large amount of blood, and at one
time told Dr. JVIcGuire lie thought he was dying, and would
have bled to death, but a tourniquet was immediately applied.
For two hours he was nearly pulseless from the shock.

Amputation of the arm was decided upon, and the operation
was borne so well that hopes of a speed}- recovery were confi-
dently entertained. A few days had elapsed, and his physi-
cians had decided to remove the distinguished sufferer to
Kichmond, when symptoms of pneumonia were unfortunately
developed. The complication of this severe disease with his
wounds, left but little hope of his life, and on Sunday, the
eighth day of his suffering, it was apparent that he was rap-
idly sinking, and he was informed that he was dying. The
intelligence was received with no expression of disappointment
or anxiety on the part of the dying hero ; his only response
was, "It is all right," which was repeated. Tie had pre-
viously said that he considered his wounds " a blessing," as
Providence had always a good design in whatever it ordained,
and to that Providence in which he had always trusted he
had committed himself with uninterrupted confidence. But
once he regretted his early fall, and that was witli reference
to the immediate f(.»rtunes of the field. He said : " If I had
not been wounded, or had had an hour more of daylight,
I would have cut off the enemy from the road to the
United States ford, and we would have had them entirely
surrounded, and they would have been obliged to surrender or
cut their way out ; they had no other alternative. My troops
sometimes may fail in driving the enemy from a position, but
the enemy always fail to drive my men from a position." This
was said with a sort of smiling playfulness.

The following account of the dying moments of the hero is
taken from the authentic testimony of a religious friend and
companion:

" He endeavored to cheer those who were around him. No-
ticing the sadness of his beloved wife, he said to her tenderly,
'I know you would gladly give your life for me, but I am4)er-
fectly resigned. Do not be sad — I hope I shall recover. Pray
for me, but always remember in your prayer, to use the jDeti-
tiou. Thy will be done.' Those who were around him noticed
a remarkable development of tenderness in his manner and

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 265

feelings during his illness, that was a beautiful mellowing of
that iron sternness and imperturbable calm that characterized
him in his military operations. Advising his wife, in the
event of his death, to return to her father's house, he remarked,
'You have a kind and good father; but there is no one so kind
and good as _your Heavenly Father.' When she told him that
the Sectors did not think he could live two hours, although he
did not himself expect to die, he replied, 'It will be infinite
gain to be translated to Heaven and be with Jesus.' He then
said he had much to say to her, but was too weak.

"He had always desired to die, if it were God's will, on the
Sabbath, and seemed to greet its light that day witli peculiar
j)leasure, saying, with evident delight, 'It is the Lord's day;'
and inquired anxiously what provision had been made for
preaching to the army ; and having ascertained that arrange-
ments were made, he was contented. Delirium, which occa-
sionally manifested itself during the last two days, prevented
some of the utterances of his faith, which would otherwise
have doubtless been made. His thoughts vibrated between
religious subjects and the battle-field; now asking some ques-
tions about the Bible, or church history, and then giving an
order — 'Pass the infantry to the front.' 'Tell Major Hawks
to send forward provisions to the men.' 'Let us cross over the
river, and rest under the shade of the trees,' — until at last his
gallant spirit gently passed over the dark river and entered on
its rest,"

It is not proposed here, nor could space be found within the
limits of a supplementary chapter to make a record of the life
and services of Gen. Jackson. A very brief sketch is all that
is possible ; and indeed it is scarcely necessary to do more, as
so much of his military life is already spread on the pages of
this volume and intermixed with the general narrative of the
war.

Gen. Thomas Jonathan Jackson was born in Harrison county,
V^irginia, in 1825, and graduated at West Point in 1846. His
first military services were in the Mexican war, and he behaved
so well that he was breveted major for his services. The Army
Register and the actual history and facts of the Mexican war
do not furnish the name of another person entering the war
without position or oflice, who attained the high rank of major

266 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

in tlie brief campaign and series of battles from Yera Craz to
the city of Mexico

At the close of the Mexican war Jackson resigned his posi-
tion in the army, and obtained a professorship in the Virginia
Military Institute. His services were not conspicuous here.
Col. Gilham was considered as the military genius of the
school, and Thomas Jackson was but little thought of by the
small hero-worshippers of Lexington. The cadets had but
little partiality for the taciturn, praying professor.

Perhaps none of the acquaintances of Jackson were more
surprised at his brilliant exhibitions of genius in this war, than
those who knew his blank life at the Institute, and were familiar
with the stiff and uninteresting figure that was to be seen every
Sunday in a pew of the Presbyterian Church at Lexington. But
true genius awaits occasion commensurate with its power and
aspiration. The spirit of Jackson was trained in another school
than that of West Point or Lexington, and had it been confined
there, it never would have illuminated the page of history.

In the early periods of the war, Jackson, commissioned colonel
by the Governor of Yirginia, was attached to Gen. Johnston's
command, on the Upper Potomac. At Falling Waters, on the
2d of July, 1861, he engaged the advance of Patterson, and
gave the Yankees one of the first exemplifications of his ready-
witted strategy ; as Patterson never knew that, for several hours,
he was fighting an insignificant force, skilfully disposed to con-
ceal their weakness, while Johnston was making his dispositions
in the rear.

The first conspicuous services of Jackson in this war were
rendered at Manassas, in 1861 ; although the marks of active
determination he had shown on the Upper Potomac, and the
afifair at Falling Waters, had already secured for him promo-
tion to a brigadier-generalship. The author recollects some
paragraphs in a Southern newspaper expressing great merri-
men.t at the first apparttion of the future hero on the battle-
field. His queer figure on horseback, and the habit of settling
his chin in his stock, were very amusing to some correspond-
ents, who made a flippant jest in some of the Southern news-
papers of the military specimen of the Old Dominion. The
jest is forgiven and forgotten in the tributes of admiration and
love which were to ensue to the popular hero of the war.

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 267

"We have already given in another part of this work (the
first volume), an account of the remarkable expedition of Jack
Bon in the depth of the winter of 1S61-2, to Winchester, where
he had been sent from Gen. Johnston's lines. The expedition
was successful, and the inarch was made through an almost
blinding storm of snow and sleet, our troops bivouacking at
night in the forest, where many died from cold and exhaustion.

Without doubt, the most brilliant and extraordinary passages
in the military life of General Jackson was the ever famous
campaign of the summer of 1862 in the Yalley of Yirginia.
From the valley he reached by rapid marches the lines of the
Chickahominy in time to play a conspicuous part in the splen-
did conclusion of the campaign of the Peninsula.

Since the battles of the Chickahominy, the military services
of General Jackson are comparatively fresh in the recollections
of the public. We have already seen in these pages that the
most substantial achievements and brilliant successes of last
summer's campaign in Yirginia are to be attributed to him.

The participation of Jackson in the campaign of Maryland,
and that of the Kappahannock, shared their glory, but without
occasion for observation on those distinct and independent
movements which were h.\?,forte^ and for the display of which
he had room in the valley campaign, and that against Pope.

The most noble testimony of the services of the departed
hero in the battle of Chancellorsville is to be found in the note
of Gen. Lee, which is characteristic of his own generosity and
worth. Gen. Lee wrote him :

" General : I have just received your note informing me
that you were wounded. I cannot express my regret at the
occurrence. Could I have dictated events, I should have chosen
for the good of the country to have been disabled in your
stead.

" I congratulate you upon the victory which is due to your
skill and energy."

Jackson's response to his attendants on hearing the note read
is said to have been, "Gen. Lee should give the glory to God."
It was an expression of his modesty and reverence.

A friend relates that a iew nights before this battle, an
equally characteristic incident occurred that is worthy of

268 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK.

record. He was discussing with one of his aids the proba-
bility and issue of a battle, when he became unusually excited.
After talking it over fully, he paused, and with deep humility
and reverence said, " My trust is in God ;" then, as if the
sound of battle was in his ear, he raised himself to his tallest
stature, and, with flashing eyes and a face all blazoned with the
fire of the conflict, he exclaimed, " I wish they would come."

A strong religious sentiment combined with practical energy,
and an apparent dash of purpose qualified by the silent calcu-
lations of genius, were the remarkable traits of the character
of Jackson. It was his humble Christian faith combined with
the spirit of the warrior that made that rare and lofty type of
martial prowess that has shrined Jackson among the great
heroes of the age.

From all parts of the living world have come tributes to his
fame. " He was," says the London Times, " one of the most
consummate generals that this century has produced. . . .
That mixture of daring and judgment, which is the mark of
'Heaven-born' generals, distinguished him beyond any man
of his time. Although the young Confederacy has been
illustrated by a number of eminent soldiers, yet the applause
and devotion of his countrj-men, confirmed by the judgment
of European nations, have given the first j)lace to Gen. Jack-
son. The military feats he accomplislied moved the minds of
the people with astonishment, which it is only given to the
highest genius to produce. The blows he struck at the enemy
were as terrible and decisive as those of Bonaparte himself."

It is proposed already that the State of Virginia shall build
for him a stately tomb, and strike a medal to secure the
memory of -his name. These expressions of a nation's grati-
tude may serve its own pleasure. But otherwise they are un-
necessary.

" Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,
What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name I"

THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAB. 269

CHAPTER XII.

A Period of Disasters. — Department of the Mississippi. — Grant's March upon
Vicksburg. — Its Steps and Incidents. — The Engagement of Port Gibson. — The Evacu-
ation of Jackson. — The Battle of Baker's Creek. — Peinberton's Declarations as to the
Defence ofVicksburg. — A grand Assault upon the " Heroic City." — Its Eepulse. —
The Final Surrender of Vickshurg. — How the Public Mind of the South was shocked.
— Consequences of the Disaster. — How it involved aflains on the Lower Mississippi.
— Other Theatres of the War. — The Camp.mqn in Pexnstlvania and Makvla nd. —
Hooker manceuvred out of Virginia. — The Recapture of Wiuchester.^The Second
Invasion of the Northern Territory. — The Alarm of the North. — Gen. Lee's object in
the Invasion of Maryland and Pennsylvania. — His Essays at Conciliation. — The Er-
ror of such Policy. — The advance of his Lines into Pennsylvania. — The Battle ot
Gettysburg. — The Three Days' Engagements. — Death of Barksdale. — Pickett's splen-
did Charge on the Batteries. — Eepulse of the Confederates. — An.xiety and Alarm in
Richmond. — Lee's safe Retreat into Virginia. — Mystery of his Movement. — Recovery

of the Confidence of the South Review of the Present Aspects of the

War. — Comparison between the Disasters of 1862 and those of 1863. — Tlie Vitals of
the Confederacy yet untouched. — Review of the Civil Administration. — President
Davis, his Cabinet, and his Favorites. — His private Quarrels. — His Deference to Euro-
pean Opinion. — Decline of the Finances of the Confederacy. — Reasons of tlieir Decline.
The Confederate Brokers. — The Blockade Runners. — The Disatfections of Property-
holders. — The Spirit of the Army. — The Moral Resolution of the Confederacy. — How
the Enemy has strengthened it. — The Prospects of the Future.

"We find it necessary to give another chapter to the exten-
sion of our narrative beyond its appropriate limit. We shall
proceed rapidly with a general reference to such events as may
exhibit the condition of the Confederacy at the time of this
writing, reserving details for another volume that will properly
cover the period of the third year of the War. That year has
opened with disasters, at which we can now glance only im-
perfectly, for upon them the lights of time have scarcely yet
developed.

DEPARTMENT OF THE MISSISSIPPI.

As the attention of the reader returns to the busy scenes of
the war, it is taken by one of those sudden translations, so
common in this history, from Yirginia to the distant theatres
of the West. The smoke of battle yet lingered on the Rappa-
nock, when the attention of the public was suddenly drawn to

270 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

the Yalle}'^ of the Mississippi bj the startling announcement
that an army of the enemy was on the overland march against
Yicksburg, that had so long defied an attack from. the water.

We ha%^e at this time only very uncertain materials for the
history of the campaign in Mississippi. We must at present
trust ourselves to a very general outline that will exclude any
considerable extent of comment ; satisfied that what we can do
at present to interest the reader is simply to put certain leading
occurrences of the campaign in their natural succession, and
make a compact resume of events which, up to this time, have
been related in a very confused and scattering style.

By running the gauntlet of our batteries at Vicksburg with
his transports. Grant avoided the necessity of the completion
of the canal, and secured a passage of the river, after leading
his troops over the narrow peninsula below Yicksburg, at any
point above Port Hudson wliich he might select. It appears
that the defences at Grand Gulf, twenty-two miles south of
Warrenton, at the mouth of Bkick river, were only constructed
after the enemy had succeeded in getting some of his vessels
between Port Hudson and Vicksburg. The Black river being
navigable for some distance, they were intended to obstruct
the passage of a force to the rear of Vicksburg by this route.

The abandonment of our works there, after a severe bombard-
ment, opened the door to the enemy, and the battle of Port
Gibson, fought on the 1st day of May, put them still further
on their way to Vicksburg. The evacuation of Port Gibson
by Gen. Bo wen was followed by that of Bayou Pierre, and his
forces were withdrawn across the Big Black within twenty
miles of Vicksburg.

So far in the campaign the enemy had a remarkable advan-
tage. Our generals were wholly unable to penetrate his de-
signs, and were compelled to wait the progressive steps of their
development.

It was impossible to foresee the precise point at which the
blow would be struck, or to form any probable conjecture of
the immediate objects of the enemy's enterprise. When Grant's
transports had succeeded in passing the batteries at Vicksburg,
he had a river front of more than a hundred miles where he
could land. The point of his landing having been determined
at Grand Gulf, it was still uncertain whether he meant to ap-

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 271

proacli Yicksbnrg by the river, under cover of his gunboats, or
whetlier he would attempt to circumscribe the place and cut
our communications east. It subsequently appeared that the
latter enterprise was selected by the enemy, and that Jackson
was the inmiediate point of attack.

On the 14th of May tlie enemy took possession of Jackson.
Gen. Johnston was intrusted with the active command of the
Confederate forces in the southwest too late to save those dis-
astrous results which had already occurred ; and the very first
step to which he was forced by existing circumstances was the
evacuation of Jackson. But the enemy's occupation of the
capital of Mississippi seems to have been but an unimportant
incident, and it is probable that, even with inferior forces on
our side, a battle would have been risked there if Jackson had
been of greater importance than as a point of railroad in pos-
session of the enemy.

Although Gen. Bowen, in the engagement of Port Gibson,
failed to check the rapid advance of the enemy, it was under-
stood that he had been able to evacuate in good order his po-
sition south of the Big Black, and establish a line of defence,
extending along that stream east from the Mississippi, so as to
secure Vicksburg against assault from the south. This, the
main line of our defence, was occupied by Gen. Pemberton
with heavy reinforcements from Yicksburg.

On the 16th of May occurred the bloody battle of Baker's
creek (on the Jackson and Vicksburg road), in which the
force under Pemberton was defeated, with considerable loss of
artiller3^ On the following day the Confederates again sus-
tained a disaster at Big Black bridge ; and on the 18th Yicks-
burg was closely invested by the enemy, and the i-ight of his
army rested on the river above the town.

It is probable that it was to give time for reinforcements to
arrive in the enemy's rear, who, flushed with victor}^ at Grand
Gulf, Port Gibson, and Jackson, had turned back from the
latter on the rear defences of Yicksburg, that Gen. Pemberton,
perhaps unwisely, advanced from his works to meet Grant in
the open field and hold him in check, and thus, from greatly
inadequate forces, suffered the disheartening disasters of Ba-
ker's creek and Big Black bridge. As a last resort he retired
behind his works with a weakened and somewhat dispirited

272 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

but still glorious little army. The unfortunate commander ap-
peased the clamor against himself bj an apparently noble can-
dor and memorable words of heroism. He said that it had
been declared that he would sell Yicksburg, and exhorted his
soldiers to follow him to see the price at which he would sell
it — for it would not be less than his own life and that of every
man in his command. Those words were not idle utterances ;
they deserve to be commemorated ; they were heroic only in
proportion as they were fulfilled and translated into action.

The events of the 19rh, 20th, and 21st of May wearied the
Yankees, who imagined that they saw in their grasp the palm
of the Mississippi. So fully assured were they of victory, that
they postponed it from day to day. To storm the works was
to take Yicksburg, in their opinion ; and when it was known,
on the morning of the 21st, that at ten o'clock next morning
the whole line of Confederate works would be assaulted, the
credulous and vain enemy accounted success so certain that it
was already given to the wings of the telegraph.

Indeed, there is no doubt that at one hour of this famous
day, McClernand, the Yankee general who made the assault
on the left, sent a dispatch to Grant that he had taken three
forts, and would soon be in possession of the city. But the
success was a deceitful one. The redoubts carried by the en-
emy brought him within the pale of a devouring fire. At every
point he was repulsed ; and with reference to completeness of
victory, exhibitions of a devoted courage, and the carnage ac-
complished in the ranks of the enemy, these battles of Vicks-
bure: must be accounted amono- the most famous in the annals
of the war.

But despite the discouragements of the repulse, there still
remained to the enemy the prospects of a siege under circum-
stances of peculiar and extraordinary advantage. Although
Grant's attack was made from Grand Gulf, that place was not
long his base ; and when he gained Haines' Bluff and the
Yazoo, all communication with it was abandoned. He was
enabled to rely on Memphis and the river above Yicksburg for
food and reinforcements ; his communications were open with
the entire West ; and the Northern newspapers urgently de-
manded that the utmost support should be given to a favorite

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 273

general, and that the Trans-Mississippi should be stripped of
troops to supply him with reinforcements.

But the South still entertained hopes of the safety of Yicks-
burg. It was stated in Richmond by those who should have
been well informed, that the garrison numbered considerably
more than twenty thousand men, and was provisioned for a
siege of six months. Nearly every day the telegraph had
some extravagance to tell concerning the supreme safety of
Yicksburg and the confidence of the garrison. The heroic
promise of Pemberton that the city should not fall until the
last man had fallen in the last ditch was called to the popular
remembrance. The confidence of the South was swollen even
to insolence by these causes ; and although a few of the intel-
ligent doubted the extravagant assurances of the safety of
Yicksburg, the people at large received them with an unhesi-
tating and exultant faith.

IJMder these circumstances the surprise and consternation of
the people of the South may be imagined, when, without the
least premonition, the announcement came that the select an-
niversary of the Fourth of July had been signalized by the
capitulation of Yicksburg, without a fight; the surrender of
twenty odd thousand troops as prisoners; and the abandon-
ment to the Yankees of one of the greatest prizes of artillery
that had yet been made in the war. The news fell upon Rich-
mond like a thunder-clap from clear skies. The day of our
humiliation at Yicksburg had been ill-selected. But it was
said that Gen. Pemberton was advised that the enemy intended
to make a formidable assault on the next day, and that he was
unwilling to await it with an enfeebled garrison, many of whom
were too weak to bear arms in their hands. The condition of
the garrison, although certainly not as extreme as that which
Pemberton had heroically prefigured as the alternative of sur-
render, and although holding no honorable comparison with
the amount of privation and sufi'ering borne in other sieges re-
corded in history, was yet deplorable. Our troops had suflPered
more from exhausting labors than from hunger; and their
spirit had been distressed by the melancholy isolation of a siege
in which they were cut off from communication with their
homes, and perhaps by other causes which are not now cer-
tainly known. Patience is not a virtue of Southern soldiers j

18

274:

THE SECOND TEAR OF TEIE WAK.

and for it at least the garrison of Yicksburg will not be con-
spicuous in history.

It is not possible at this time to determine the consequences
of the fall of Yicksburg. That it was the ostensible key to a
vast amount of disputed territory in the West, and that it in-
volved a network of important positions, were universally ad-
mitted in the South. But this estimate of its importance is
intricate and uncertain, and awaits the development of events.
The army of Johnston was saved, instead of being risked in
an attack on Grant's rear at Yicksburg, and is still disputing
the enemy's encroachments in the Southwest. We must leave
its movements to more convenient and future narration.

But we must recognize the fact of various disasters which
have immediately ensued from the fall of Yicksburg. It com-
pelled the surrender of Port Hudson as its necessary conse-
quence.* It neutralized in a great measure a remarkable series

* The fall of Port Hudson did not take place until after a prolonged and gal-
lant resistance, the facts of which may be briefly commemorated here. On the
morning of the 22d of May, the enemy, under command of Gen. Banks, pushed
his infantry forward within a mile of our breastworks. Having taken his posi-
tion for the investment of our works, he advanced with his whole force against
the breastworks, directing his main attack against the left, commanded by Col.
Steadman. Vigorous assaults were also made against the extreme left of Col.
Miles and Gen. Beale, the former of whom commanded on the centre, the latter
on the right. On the left the attack was made by a brigade of negroes, com-
posing about three regiments, together with the same force of white Yankees
across a bridge which had been built over Sandy creek. About five hundred
negroes in front advanced at double-quick within one hundred and fifty yards
of the works, when the artillery on the river bluif, and two light pieces on our
left, opened upon them, and at the same time they were received with volleys
of musketry. The negroes fled every way in perfect con''usion, and, according
to the enemy's report, sis hundred of them perished. The repulse on Miles'
left was decisive.

On the 13th of June :a communication was received from Gen. Banks, de-
manding the unconditional surrender of the post. He complimented the gar-
rison in high terms for their endurance. He stated that his artillery was equal
to any "in extent and eflSciency ; that liis men outnumbered ours five to one,
and that he demanded the surrender in the name of humanity, to prevent a
useless sacrifice of life. Gen. Gardner replied that his duty required him to de-
fend the post, and he must refuse to entertain any such proposition.

On the morning of the 14th, just before day, the fleet and all the land bat-
teries, which the enemy had succeeded in erecting at one hundred to three hun-
dred yards from our breastworks, opened fire at the same time. About day-
light, under cover of the smoke, the enemy advanced along the whole line, and

THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAE. 275

of successes on the I^ower Mississippi, including the victory of
Gen. Taylor at Ashland, Louisiana, which broke one of the
points of investment around Vicksburg, and his still more
glorious achievement in the capture of Brashear City. The
defence of the cherished citadel of the Mississippi had involved
exposure and weakness in other quarters. It had almost strip-
ped Charleston of troops ; it had taken many thousand men
from Bragg's army ; and it had made such requisitions on his
force for the newly organized lines in Mississippi, that that
general was compelled or induced, wisely or unwisely, to fall
back from Tullahoma, to give up the country on the Memphis
and Charleston railroad, and practically to abandon the de-
fence of Middle Tennessee.

While people in Richmond were discussing the story of
Yicksburg, the grief and anxiety of that disaster were sud-
denly swallowed up by what was thought to be even more

in many places approached witliin ten feet of our works. Our brave soldiers
were wide awake, and, opening upon them, drove them back in confusion, a
great number of them being left dead in the ditches. One entire division and
a brigade were ordered to charge the position of the 1st Mississippi and the 9th
Alabama, and by the mere physical pressure of numbers some of them got
within the works, but all these were immediately killed. After a sharp con-
test of two hours, the enemy were everywhere repulsed, and withdrew to their
old lines.

During the remainder of the month of June, there was heavy skirmishing
daily, with constant firing night and day from the gun and mortar boats. Du-
ring the siege of six weeks, from May 27th to July 7th, inclusive, the enemy
must have fired from fifty to seventy-five thousand shot and shell, yet not more
than twenty-five men were killed by these projectiles. They had worse dangers
than these to contend against.

About the 39th or 30th of June, the garrison's supply of meat gave out, when
Gen. Gardner ordered the mules to be butchered, after ascertaining that the
men were willing to eat them. At the same time the supply of ammunition
was becoming exhausted, and at the time of the surrender there were only
twenty rounds of cartridges left, with a small supply for artillery.

On Tuesday, July 7th, salutes were fired from the enemy's batteries and gun-
boats, and loud cheering was heard along the entire line, and Yankees who
were in conversing distance of our men told them that Vicksburg had fallen.
That night about ten o'clock Gen. Gardner summoned a council of war, who,
without exception, decided that it was impossible to hold out longer, consider-
ing that the provisions of the garrison were exhausted, the ammunition almost
expended, and a large proportion of the men sick or so exhausted as to be unfit
for duty. The surrender was accomplished on the morning of the 9th. The
number of the garrison which surrendered was between five and six thousand,
of whom not more than half were effective men for duty.

276 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAH.

painful news from the army of Gen. Lee, For once it appeared
to the popular imagination that a great disaster in the West
liad a companion in the East. The fall of Yicksburg was pre-
ceded but one day by the battle of Gettysburg. To that bat-
tle-field we must translate the reader by a very rapid summary
of the operations which led to it.

y

THE CAMPAIGN IN PENNSYLVANIA AND MARYLAND.

By a series of rapid movements, Gen. Lee had succeeded
in manoeuvring Hooker out of "Virginia. On the extreme left,
Jenkins with his cavalry, began the movement by threatening
Milroy at Winchester, while, under the dust of Stuart's noisy
cavalry reviews, designed to engage the attention of the ene-
my, Ewell's infantry marched into the valley by way of Front
Royal. Advancing by rapid marches acrosf the Blue Kidge,
Gen. Ewell, the successor to Jackson's command, fell like a
thunder-bolt upon Milroy at Winchester and Martinsburg,
capturing the greater part of his forces, many guns, and heavy
supplies of grain, ammunition, and other military stores. The
Yankees' own account of their disaster indicated the magni-
tude of our success. The New York Herald declared, " not a
thing was saved except that which was worn or carried upon
the persons of the troops. Three entire batteries of field artil-
lery and one battery of siege guns — all the artillery of the
command, in fact — about two hundred and eighty wagons,
over twelve hundred horses and mules, all the commissary
and quartermaster's stores, and ammunition of all kinds, over
six thousand muskets and small arms without stint, the private
baggage of the officers and men, all fell into the hands of the
enemy. Of the seven thousand men of the command, but
from sixteen, hundred to two thousand have as yet arrived
here, leaving to be accounted for five thousand men."

After accomplishing his victory at Winchester, Gen. Ewell
moved promptly up to the Potomac, and occupied such fords
as we might desire to use, in the event it should be deemed
proper to advance into the enemy's country. The sudden ap-
pearance of Ewell in the valley of the Shenandoah, coupled
with the demonstration at Culpepper, made it necessary for
Hooker to abandon Fredericksburg entirely, and to occupy the

• THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAE. 277

strong positions at Centreville and Manassas, so as to inter-
pose his army between us and Washington, and thus prevent
a sudden descent from the Bhie Ridge by Gen. Lee upon the
Yankee capitaL Meanwhile, Longstreet and Hill were follow-
ing fast upon Swell's track, the former reaching Ashby's and
Snicker's Gaps in time to prevent any movement upon Ewell's
rear, and the latter (Hill) getting to Culpepper in good season
to protect Longstreet's rear, or to co-operate with him in the
event of an attack upon his flank, or to guard against any de-
monstration in the direction of Richmond,

Having gained over the Yankee commander the important
advantage of the military initiative, and firmly established his
communications in the rear of his base of operations on the
other side of the Potomac, Gen. Lee was in a position to hurl
his forces wherever he might desire ; and it was soon announced
in the North that Hooker had declined a battle in Yirginia,
and that the second invasion of the Northern territory had
been commenced by the Confederates under auspices that had
not attended the first. It wa^ soon known that the light horse-
men of Lee had appeared upon his war path in the southern
region of Pennsylvania. For weeks the dashing and adventu-
rous cavalry of Jenkins and Imboden were persistently busy in
scouring the country between the Susquehannah and the Alle-
ghanies, the Monocacy and the Potomac, and from the lines
before Harrisburg to the very gates of "Washington and Balti-
more their trumpets had sounded.

The North was thrown into paroxysms of terror. At the
first news of the invasion, Lincoln had called for a hundred
thousand men to defend Washington. Governor Andrews of-
fered the whole military strength of Massachussetts in the ter-
rible crisis. Governor Seymour of New York, summoned
McClellan to grave consultations respecting the defences of
Pennsylvania. The bells were set to ringing in Brooklyn.
Eegiment after regiment was sent oflF from New York to Phil-
adelphia. The famous Seventh regiment took the field and
proceeded to Harrisburg. The Dutch farmers in the valley
drove their cattle to the mountains, and the archives were re-
moved from Harrisburo;.

Nor did the alarm exceed the occasion for it. It was obvi-
ous to the intelligent in the North that their army of the Po-

278 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

tomac was the only real obstacle which could impede the
triumphant march of the army of Lee into the very heart of
the Yankee States, and in whatever direction he might choose
to push his campaign. The press attempted some ridiculous
comfort by writing vaguely of tliousands of militia springing
to arms. But the history of modern warfare afforded better
instruction, for it taught clearlj^ enough that an invading army
of regular and victorious troops could only be effectively
checked by the resistance of a similar army in the field, or of
fortified places strong enough to compel a regular siege. In
certain circumstances, a single battle had often decided the
fate of a long war ; and the South easily indulging the pros-
pect of the defeat of Hooker's forces, was elated with renewed
anticipations of an early peace.

While the destruction of Hooker's army was the paramount
object of Gen. Lee's campaign, he had unfortunately fallen
into the error of attempting to conciliate the people of the
North and to court the opinions of Europe by forswearing all
acts of retaliation and omitting even the devastation of the
enemy's country. The fertile acres of the Pennsylvania valley
were imtouched by violent hands ; all requisitions for supplies
were paid for in Confederate money ; and a protection was given
to the private property of the enemy, which had never been
afforded even to that of our own citizens. So far as the orders
of Gen. Lee on these subjects restrained pillage and private
outrage, they were sustained by public sentiment in the South,
which, in fact, never desired that we should retaliate upon the
Yankees by a precise imitation of their enormities and crimes.
But retaliation is not only the work of pillagers and marauders.
Its ends might have been accomplished, as far as the people of
the South desired, by inflicting upon the enemy some injury
commensurate with what they had suffered at his hands ; the
smallest measure of which would have been the devastation of
the country, which, done by our army in line of battle, would
neither have risked demoralization nor detracted from disci-
pline. Such a return for the outrages which the South had
suffered from invading hordes of th'fe Yankees, would in fact
have been short of justice, and so far have possessed the merit
of magnanimity. But Gen. Lee was resolved on more exces-
sive magnanimity ; and at the time the Yankee armies, par-

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 279

ticularly in the Southwestern portion of the Confederacy, were
enacting outrages which recalled the darkest days of mediaeval
warfare, our forces in the Pennsylvania valley were protecting
the private property of Yankees, composing their alarm, and
making a display of stilted chivalry to the amusement of the
Dutch farmers and to the intense disgust of our own people.*

If Gen. Lee had supposed that his moderate warfare would
conciliate the Yankees, he was greatly mistaken ; for it is pre-
cisely this warfare which irritates a people without intimidat-
ing them. The simple object of his campaign appears to have
been the defeat of Hooker, which would uncover Washington
and Baltimore. The critical conjuncture which had been so long
sought was the battle of Gettysburg.

We must spare here many of the details of those movements
which brought the two armies in contact, and trust ourselves
to a brief and general account of this great engagement in
Pennsylvania, followed, as it is, by a rapid current of events
there and elsewhere.

* A letter from our lines in Mississippi thus describes the outrages of the
enemy there, which were cotemporary with Lee's civilities in Pennsylvania :

" I thought the condition of Northern Mississippi, and the country around
my own home in Memphis, deplorable. There robberies were committed,
houses were burned, and occasionally a helpless man or woman was murdered ;
but here, around Jackson and Vicksburg, there are no terms used in all the
calendar of crimes which could convey any adequate conception of the revolt-
ing enormities perpetrated by our foes. Women have been robbed of their
jewelry and wearing apparel — stripped almost to nakedness in the presence of
jeering Dutch ; ear-rings have been torn from their ears, and rings from bleed-
ing fingers. Every house has been pillaged, and thousands burned. The
whole country between the Big Black and the Mississippi, and all that district
through which Grant's army passed, is one endless scene of desolation. This
is not the worst ; robbery and murder are surely bad enough, but worse than
all this, women have been subjected to enormities worse than death.

" Negroes, men and women, who can leave their homes, are forced or enticed
away. The children alone are left. Barns and all descriptions of farmhouses
have been burned. All supplies, bacon and flour, are seized for the use of the
invading army, and the wretched inhabitants left to starve. The roads along
which Grant's army has moved, are strewn with all descriptions of furniture,
wearing apparel, and private property. In many instances husbands have been
arrested and threatened with instant death by the hangman's rope, in order to
make their wives reveal tlie places of concealment of their valuable effects.
The poor women are made to ransom their sons, daughters, and husba^jds. Thr?
worst slaves are selected to insult, taunt and revile their masters, and the wives
and daughters of their masters."

280 THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAE.

Having crossed the Potomac at or near WilHamsport, the
Confederates marched to Hagerstown, to Greencastle, and
thence to Chambersburg. Ewell, who held the advance, went
as far as Carlisle, some twelve miles from Harrisburg. Mean-
while, Hooker, having withdrawn his forces from Stafford,
moved to and across the Potomac, and took np a line extend-
ing from Washington to Baltimore, expecting Gen. Lee to offer
him battle in Maryland. Finding himself disappointed in this,
and compelled by pride or by his superiors, he relinquished
his command to Mead, who, finding out that Lee had deflected
in his march through Pennsylvania, and was moving down the
Baltimore turnpike from Chambersburg, moved from Balti-
more on the same road to meet him. The two armies which
had ceased to confront each other since the breaking up of the
Fredericksburg lines, found themselves again face to face near
Gettysburg, on Wednesday, July 1st.

The action of the 1st July was brought on by Gen. Reynolds,
who held the enemy's advance, and who thought himself in
superior force to the Confederates. He paid the penalty ot
his temerity by a defeat ; he was overpowered and outflanked,
and fell mortally wounded on the field.

In this fight the corps of A. P. Hill was generally engaged ;
but, about one hour after its opening. Gen. Ewell, who was
moving from the direction of Carlisle, came up and took a po-
sition on our extreme left. Two divisions of this corps, Phodes'
and Early's, advanced upon and engaged the enemy in front.
Longstreet, who was not engaged in the fight of the first day,
swung around his column to A. P. Hill's right, but did not
take position for action until Thursday morning. The result
of the first day was that the enemy was repulsed at all points
of the line engaged, and driven over the i-ange of hills to the
south of Gettysburg, through the town and about half a mile
beyond. At this point is a mountain which commands the
ground in front for a mile on all sides. This the enemy re-
treated to after their repulse, and immediately fortified, their
line occupying the mountain, and extending on the right and
left of it.

The early part of Tiiursday, the 22d of July, wore away
without' any positive demonstration of attack on either side.
Late in the afternoon an artillery attack was made by our

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 281

forces on the left and centre of the enemy, which was rapidly
followed by the advance of our infantry, Longstreet's corps on
our side being principally engaged. A fearful but indecisive
conflict ensued, and for four hours the sound of musketry was «
incessant. In the fight we lost a number of ofiicers, among
them Gen. Barksdale of Mississippi, whose brave and generous
spirit expired, where he preferred to die, on the ensanguined
field of battle. Of this " haughty rebel," who had fallen within
their lines, the Yankees told with devilish satisfaction the story
that his end was that of extreme agony, and his last words
were to crave aS a dying boon a cup of water and a stretcher
from an ambulance boy. The letter of a Yankee officer testi-
fies that the brave and suffering hero declared with his last
breath that he was proud of the cause he died fighting for ;
proud of the manner in which he received his death ; and con-
fident that his countrymen were invincible.

The third day's battle was commenced by the Confederates.
The enemy's position on the mountain was apparently impreg-
nable, for there was no conceivable advance or approach that
could not be raked and crossed with the artillery. The reserve
artillery and all the essentials to insure victory to the Yankees
were in position at the right time. All the heights and every
advantageous position along the entire line where artillery
could be massed or a battery planted, frowned down on the
Confederates through brows of brass and iron. On the slopes
of this mountain occurred one of the most terrific combats of
modern times, in which three hundred cannon were belching
forth their thunders at one time, and nearly two hundred
thousand muskets were being discharged as rapidly as men
hurried with excitement and passion could load them.

The battle of Friday had commenced early in the morning.
With the exception from ten o'clock in the morning to one in
the afternoon, it lasted all day. The Confederates did not suc-
ceed in holding any of the crests, although one or two were
reached ; and night again closed on the smoke-wrapped field..

The most glorious incident of Gettysburg, and the one upon
which the eye of history will beam, was the charge of our
devoted men upon the deadly heights where turned the tide of
battle. The principal stronghold of the enemy was known as
McPherson's heights, where his centre rested. In Thursday's

282 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAB.

fight this important position had for a short time been in pos-
session of a single one of our brigades — "Wright's noble Geor-
gians— who had charged it with the bayonet and captured the
heavy batteries on the crest, but were unable to hold it for
want of timely support.

In Friday's contest, a more formidable and elaborate attempt
was to be made to wrest from the enemy the crest which was
the key of his position. Pickett's division being in the ad-
vance, was supported on the right by Wilson's brigade, and on
the left by Heth's division, commanded by Pettigrew. The
steady movement of Pickett's men into the tempest of fire and
steel, against a mountain bristling with guns, had nothing to
exceed it in sublimity on any of the battle-fields of the revolu-
tion. Into the sheets of artillery fire advanced the unbroken
lines of our men. The devoted Confederates are struggling
not only against the enemy's artillery, but against a severe fire
from heavy masses of his infantry, posted behind a stone fence.
But nothing checks their advance ; they storm the fence, they
shoot the gunners, and Kemper's and Armistead's banners are
already planted on the enemy's works.

There is no doubt but that at this auspicious moment a
proper amount of support to Pickett M^ould have secured his
position, and carried the fortunes of the day. But that sup-
port was not at hand. Pettigrew's division had faltered, and
that gallant commander in vain strove to rally the raw troops.
In the mean time, the enemy had moved around strong flank-
ing bodies of infantry, and was rapidly gaining Pickett's rear.
With overwhelming numbers in our front, almost hemmed in
by the enemy, the order is given to fall back. The retreating
line is pressed heavily. It does not give way ; but many noble
spirits who had passed safely through the fiery ordeal of the
advance and charge, now fall on the right and on the left.

In this great battle, though unfavorable to us, the enemy's
loss probably exceeded our own, as the Yankees were closely
crowded on the hills, and devoured by our artillery fire. The
information of the enemy's loss is perhaps most accurately ob-
tained from the bulletin furnished by his Surgeon-general,
which stated that he had something over 12,000 Yankees
wounded under his control. Counting one killed for four
wounded, and making some allowance for a large class of

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK. 283

■wounded men who had not come under the control of the
official- referred to, we are justified in stating the enemy's loss,
in casualties at Gettysburg, as somewhere between fifteen and
eighteen thousand. Our loss, slighter by many thousands in
comparison, was yet frightful enough. On our side, Pickett's
division had been engaged in the hottest work of the day, and
the havoc in its ranks was appalling. Its losses on this day
are famous, and should be commemorated in detail. Every
briffadier in the division was killed or wounded. Out of
twenty-four regimental officers, only two escaped unhurt. Th^
colonels of five Virginia regiments were killed. The 9th Vir-
ginia went in two hundred and fifty strong, and came out with
only thirty-eight men, while the equally gallant 19th rivalled
the terrible glory of such devoted courage.

The recoil at Gettysburg was fatal, not necessarily, but by
the course of events, to Gen. Lee's campaign ; and the return
of his army to its defensive lines in Virginia, was justly re-
garded in the South as a reverse in the general fortunes of the
contest. Yet the immediate results of the battle of Gettys-
burg must be declared to have been to a great extent negative.
The Confederates did not gain a victory, neither did the enemy.
The general story of the contest is simple. Lee had been
unable to prevent the enemy from taking the highlands, many
of them with very steep declivities, and nearly a mile in slope.
The battle was an effort of the Confederates to take those
heights. The right flank, the left flank, the centre, were suc-
cessively the aim of determined and concentrated assaults.
The Yankee lines Were broken and driven repeatedly. But
inexhaustible reserves, and a preponderant artillery, advan-
tageously placed, saved them from rout.

The flrst news received in Richmond of Gen. Lee's retreat
was from Yankee sources, which represented his army as a dis-
organized mass of fugitives, unable to cross the Potomac on
account of recent floods, and at the mercy of an enemy im-
mensely superior in numbers and flushed with victory. This
news and that of the fall of Vicksburg reached the Confeder-
ate capital the same day. Twenty -four hours served to dash
the hope of an early peace, and to overcloud the horizon of the
war. The temptation of despair was again whispered to weak
minds. It was the second period of great disaster to the

284- THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

South, and renewed a grief similar to what had been expended
a year ago upon the sorrowful stories of Donelson and New
Orleans.

But liappilj" in this instance the public despondency was of
short duration. A few days brought news from our lines, which
exploded the falsehoods of the Yankees, and assured the people
of the South that the engagements of Gettysburg had resulted
in worsting the enemy, in killing and wounding a number ex-
ceeding our own, and in the capture of a large number of
prisoners. The public was yet further satisfied that the fall-
ing back of our army, at least as far as Hagerstown, was a
movement dictated by general considerations of strategy and
prudence. It consoled itself that the subsequent retirement of
our forces into Yirginia was the excess of safety ; and it found
reason for congratulation that the retreat of Lee to his old
lines was accomplished with a dexterity and success that foiled
the enemy, and disappointed the greater portion of his tri-
umph.

But ijot withstanding these causes of moderate thankfulness,
it must be confessed that the retreat from Hagerstown across
the Potomac was an inconsequence and a mystery to the intel-
ligent public. Lee's position there was strong ; his force was
certainly adequate for another battle ; preparations were made
for aggressive movements; and in the midst of all came a
sudden renouncement of the campaign, and the retreat into
Yirginia. The history of this untimely retreat has not been
developed ; but there is one fact to assist the explanation of it,
and that is that the authorities at Richmond were much more
alarmed than Gen. Lee, and much less capable than the com-
mander himself of judging the military situation from which
his army was recalled. The troops availed themselves of no
other refuge than that of their own soil ; they had not been
defeated or seriously worsted; and so far the public had
its secondary wish for the safety of the army. But this did
not exclude mortification on the part of those who believed that
Gen. Lee had abandoned the enemy's territory, not as a conse-
quence of defeat, but from the undue timidity or the arrogant
disposition of the authorities who controlled him. The grounds
of such a belief are not certainly stated ; but its existence in
the public mind is a fact to be recognized by the historian, and

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK. 285

to be determined by evidence, when time and occasion shall
produce it.

The check at Gettysburg and the fall of Yicksburg, which
we have seized upon as the prominent events of the summer of
1863, and of which we hope hereafter, in another volume, to
give a more minute and faithful account, in coimection with
many contemporary or closely consequent events, which are
here omitted, afford a natural pause in which we may well
review the events of the revolution, and speculate on its distant
or ultimate future.

The disasters to which we have briefly referred, although
considerable, were far from being desperate, and were scarcely
occasions of any serious alarm in the South, as to the ultimate
issue of the struggle. The military condition of the country
was certainly far better than at the former unhappy period of
the spring of 1862. Then our armies were feeble, and, in a
great measure, disorganized ; the conscription law had not gone
into operation, and our reduced forces were scattered along an
extended frontier. Now well-disciplined and seasoned armies
hold with compact forces the critical positions in the Confed-
eracy. The loss of territory, which in a European campaign,
where inland fortresses and great cities give convenient foot-
holds to an invading army, would have been estimated as a
fatal disadvantage, had a very diiferent signification in a war
between the two great American powers. Indeed it may be
said that the armies of our enemy scarcely did more than hold
the ground they stood upon, and that in a war now passing
into its third year, they had failed to touch the vitals of the
Confederacy. The temporary cession of large bodies of terri-
tory to them, was really to their disadvantage in military re-
spects ; for it occasioned the necessity of extending their lines
of communication, exposing their rear, and subjecting them-
selves, on every side, to the dangers of a hostile country, where
there were no great fortresses or citadels to protect them.

But it must be confessed that there were to be found at this
time but few subjects of congratulation in the internal condi-
tion of the Confederacy. The civil administration, in many of
the departments, was ignorant, defective, and, in some in-
stances, oppressive. The appendage of Congress might well

286 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR.

have been dispensed with in our revolution, for it accomplished
nothing; all its legislation was patch- work, and its measures
but the weak echoes of the newspapers. The extraordinary
cabinet of Mr. Davis still survived as a ridiculous cipher ; for
its members never dared to raise their voices on any public
measure, or to assert their existence beyond signing their names
to certify the laws and orders of the government, or the will of
the President.

The military pragmatism of the President was his worst fail-
ing. He had treated Price, among the earliest heroes of the
war, with cold and insolent neglect. He had constrained Gus-
tavus Smith to resign, and deprived the country of one of its
most brilliant generals. He had taken the unfair opportunity
of a sick furlough on the part of Beauregard, to deprive him
of his command in the West and give it to a favorite. He
had even attempted to put Jackson in leading-strings ; for it
was the Presidential order that set bounds to his famous "Win-
chester expedition, and that would have timidly recalled him
from his splendid campaign in the valley. Nor was this all.
There was reason to suppose that Lee's return from the terri-
tory of the North was constrained by the views of the Execu-
tive, and that the President, who had once defeated the cap-
ture of Washington, by his interference at the first field of
Manassas, had again repeated his intermeddling, removed a
decisive victory from the grasp of our army, and turned back
the war for years.

While such was the envious or ignorant interference of the
President with our most meritorious generals, he was not with-
out favorites. While he quarrelled with such men as Price,
Beauregard, Gustavus Smith, and Johnston, he maintained
such favorites as Holmes, Heth, Lovell, and Pemberton. No
man was ever more sovereign in his likes and dislikes. Favor-
ites were elevated to power, and the noblest spirits consigned
to obscurity by the fiat of a single man in the Confederacy,
and that man one of the strongest prejudices, the harshest ob-
stinacy, and the most ungovernable fondness for parasites.

In this war Mr. Davis has evidently been anxious to appear
in the eyes of Europe as the military genius of the Confederacy,
as well as the head of its civil administration. He has been
careless of public opinion at home. But this has been no proof

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK. 287

of stoicism or of greatness ; it has merely shown his conceit to
be in a different direction. This conceit has been that of
"provincialism" — the courting of that second-hand public
opinion which is obtained from the politicians and journalists
of Europe ; the bane of political and civil society in the South.
No man of equal public station on this continent has ever
courted the opinions of Europe more assiduously than the
President of this Confederacy. The proclamations of the Ex-
ecutive, the general orders of the army, the pronunciamentoes
of chivalry which have denied the rights of retaliation, bilked
the national conscience, and nursed a viperous enemy with the
milk of kindness, have all been composed with an eye to Eu-
ropean effect. Compromises of dignity and self-respect have
been made to conciliate foreign nations. Consuls drawing their
exequaturs from the "Washington government — a standing dero-
gation to the Confederacy which has received them — have been
sheltered and endured here ; and Europe, which denies our
rights over our territory, has received at our hands the safety
of her citizens.

We have referred in other pages to the low condition of the
finances of the Confederacy in the opening months of this year.
It had since declined much further. In February, 1862, Presi-
dent Davis had Ynade the most extravagant congratulations to
the country on our financial condition, and pointed with an
air of triumph to the failing fortunes of the enemy's treasury.
In less than eighteen months thereafter, when gold was quoted
in New York at twenty-five per cent, premium, it was selling
in Richmond at nine hundred per cent, premium ! Such have
been the results of the financial wisdom of the Confederacy,
dictated by the President, who advised Congress to authorize
illimitable issues of treasury notes, and aggravated, no doubt,
by the ignorance of his Secretary, who invented a legerdemain
of funding which succeeded not only in depreciating the cur-
rency, but also in dishonoring the government.

The experiments of Mr. Memminger on the currency was
the signal of multiplied and rapid depreciation. While the
eccentric and pious Secretary was figuring out impossible
schemes of making money, or ransacking the bookstores for
works on religious controversy, unprincipled brokers in the
Confederacy were undermining the currency with a zeal for

288 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

the destruction of their country not less than that of the Yan-
kees. The assertion admits of some qualification. Sweeping
remarks in history are generally unjust. Among those en-
gaged in the business of banking and exchange in the South,
there were undoubtedly some enlightened and public-spirited
men, who had been seduced by the example or constrained by
the competition of meaner and more avaricious men of the
same profession, to array themselves against the currency, and
to commit offences from which they would have shrunk in hor-
ror, had they not been disguised by the casuistry of commerce
and gain.

It was generally thought in the South reprehensible to re-
fuse the national currency in the payment of debts. Tet the
broker, who demanded ten dollars in this currency for one in
gold, really was guilty of nine times refusing the Confederate
money. It was accounted shocking for citizens in the South
to speculate in soldiers' clothing and bread. Yet the broker,
who demanded nine or ten prices for gold, the representative
of all values, speculated alike in every necessary in the coun-
try, l^or was this the greatest of their offences. With unsur-
passed shamelessness brokers in the Confederacy exposed the
currency of the North for sale, and demanded for it four hun-
dred per cent, premium over that of the Confederacy ! This
act of benefit to the Yankees was openly allowed by the gov-
ernment. A bill had been introduced in Congress to prohibit
this traffic, and to extirpate this infamous anomaly in our his-
tory ; but it failed of enactment, and its failure can only be at-
tributed to the grossest stupidity, or to sinister influences of
the most dishonorable kind. The traffic was immensely prof-
itable. State bonds and bank bills to the amount of many
millions were sent North by the brokers, and the rates of dis-
count were readily submitted to when the returns were made
in Yankee paper money, which, in the Eichmond shops, was
worth in Confederate notes five dollars for one.

One — but only one — cause of the depreciation of the Con-
federate currency was illicit trade. It had done more to
demoralize the Confederacy than any thing else. The inception
of this trade was easily winked at by the Confederate authori-
ties ; it commenced with paltry importations across the Poto-
mac ; it was said that the country wanted medicines, surgical

LT GEN. J. E.JOHN SON.
Trom^a FJwto^apTi taken rrmi- Izfe. .

iii.graired.foi llie SeconiTear of the W-ar.

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 289

instruments, and a number of trifles, and that trade with the
Yankees in these could result in no serious harm. But by
the enlarged license of the government it soon became an in-
famy and a curse to the Confederacy. What was a petty traffic
in its commencement soon expanded into a shameless trade,
which corrupted the patriotism of the country, constituted an
anomaly in the history of belligerents, and reflected lasting
disgrace upon the honesty and good sense of our government.
The country had taken a solemn resolution to burn the cotton
in advance of the enemy ; but the conflagration of this staple
soon came to be a rare event ; instead of being committed to
the flames it was spirited to Yankee markets. Nor were these
operations always disguised. Some commercial houses in the
Confederacy counted their gains by millions of dollars since
the war, through the favor of the government in allowing
them to export cotton at pleasure. The beneficiaries of this
trade contributed freely to public charities and did certain
favors to the government ; but their gifts were but the parings
of immense gains ; and often those who were named by weak
and credulous people or by interested flatterers as public-
spirited citizens and patriotic donors, were, in fact, the most
unmitigated extortioners and the vilest leeches on the body
politic.

In this war we owe to the cause of truth some humiliating
confessions. Whatever diminution of spirit there may have
been in the South since the commencement of her struggle, it
has been on the part of those pretentious classes of the
wealthy, who, in peace, were at once the most zealous "seces-
sionists," and the best customers of the Yankees, and who
now, in war, are naturally the sneaks and tools of the enemy.
The cotton and sugar planters of the extreme South who prior
to the war were loudest for secession, were at the same time
known to buy every article of their consumption in Yankee
markets, and to cherish an ambition of shining in the society
of Northern hotels. It is not surprising that many of these
affected patriots have found congenial occupation in this war
in planting in copartnership with the enemy, or in smuggling
cotton into his lines. The North is said to have obtained in
the progress of this war, from the Southwest and Charleston,,
enough cotton at present prices to uphold its whole system of

19

290 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR.

currenc}'- — a damning testimony of the avarice of the pLanter.
Yet it is nothing more than a convincing proof, in general, that
property, though very pretentious of patriotism, when identi-
fied with selfishness, is one of the most weak and cctwardly
things in revolutions and the first to succumb under the hor
rors of war.

It is pleasing to turn from the exhibition of ignorance and
weakness in the government, and the vile passions of its
favorites, to the contemplation of that patriotic spirit which
yet survives in the masses of the people and keeps alive the
sacred animosities of the war. We rejoice to believe that the
masses are not only yet true, but that a haughtier and fiercer
spirit than ever animates the demand of our people for inde-
pendence, and insures their efforts to obtain it. The noble
people and army who have sustained and fought this war will
have cause to rejoice. Society in the South is being upheaved
by this war, and with our independence will be re-established
on new orders of merit. The insolent and pampered slave-
holding interest of the South ; the planters' aristocracy, blown
with conceit and vulgar airs of patronage ; the boast of lands
and kin, give way before new aspirants to honor. The rei3ub-
lic gives new titles to greatness. Many of those who were
esteemed great politicians before the war, are now well-nigh
forgotten. The honors of State, the worship of society, the
rewards of affection, are for the patriots of the revolution that
will date our existence. Such are the great prizes, intertwined
with that of independence, which stir our people and army
with noble desires and beckon them to victory.

It is not only in the present external situation of the war
that encouragement is to be found for the South. With con-
siderable additions to her material elements of success, the
South has in the second year of the war abated none of that
moral resolution which is the vital and essential principle of
victory, whatever co-operation and assistance it may derive
from external conditions. That resolution has been strength-
ened by recent developments ; for as the war has progressed,
the enemy has made a full exposure of his cruel and savage
purposes, and has indicated consequences of subjugation more
terrible than death.

He has, by the hideous array of the instruments of torture

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 291

which he has prepared for a new inauguration of his authority
among those who have disputed it, not only excited the zeal of
a devoted patriotism to war with him, but has summoned even
the mean but strong passions of selfishness to oppose him.
The surrender to an enemy as base as the Yankee, might well
attract the scorn of the world, and consign the South to de-
spair. The portions of such a fate for the South are gibbets,
confiscation, foreign rule, the tutelage of New England, the
outlawry of the negro, the pangs of universal poverty, and the
contempt of mankind.

War is a thing of death, of mutilation and fire ; but it has
its law of order; and when that law is not observed, it fails in
effecting the purpose for which it is waged, and the curse it
would inflict recoils upon itself. It is remarkable in the pres-
ent war, that the policy of the Washington government has
been an increase in every feature of the first cause of the re-
volt. But this has been fortunate for the South. The con-
sequences of such despotic and savage violences, as the eman-
cipation proclamation, the arming of slaves, and the legali-
zation of plunder, have been the growth of new hostility
to the Union, and an important and obvious vindication to
the world of the motives of the South, and the virtues of her
cause.

Regarding the condition of events in which this record closes ;
the broad lustre of victories covering the space of so many
months ; the numbers of our forces in the field, unequalled at
any other period of the war; and the spirit animated by the
recollections of victorious arms, and stung by the fresh cruel-
ties of an atrocious enemy, we may well persuade ourselves
that there is no such word as "fail" in this struggle. Even
beneath the pall of disaster, there is no place for such a word.
The banners of the Confederacy do not bear the mottoes and
devices of a doubtful contest. That brave phrase we may apply
to ourselves, which is the law of progress and success ; which
summons the energies of mankind and works out the problems
of human existence ; which is at once an expression of the will
of the Creator, and the power of the creature ; and wliich
beautifully harmonizes the dispensations of Providence with
the agency of men — " Fortuna Fortibds."

292 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

CHAPTER XIII.

REVIEW — POLITICAL IDEAS IN THE NORTH, &C.

The Dogma of Numerical Majorities. — Its Date in the Yankee Mind. — Demoraliza-
tion of the Idea of the Sovereignty of Niimber.s. — Experience of Minorities in Ameri-
can Politics. — Source of the Doctrine of " Consolidation." — The Slavery Question the
logical Result of Consolidation. — Another Aspect of Consolidation in the Tariff. —
Summary of the Legislation on the Tariff. — A Yankee Picture of the Poverty of the
South. — John C. Calhoun. — President Davis' Opinion of his School of Politics. —
"NuUification," as a Union Measure. — Mr. Webster's "Four Exhaustive Proposi-
tions."— The True Interpretation of the Present Struggle of the South. — The North-
ern Idea of the Sovereignty of Numbers. — Its Results in this War. — President Lin-
coln's OiEce. — The Revenge of the Yankee Congress upon the People. — The easy
Surrender of their Liberties by the Yankees. — Lincoln and Cromwell. — Explanation
of the Political Subserviency in the Nortb. — Superficial Political Education of the
Yankee. — His "Civilization. "^The Moral Nature of the Yankee unmasked by the
War. — His new Political System. — Burnside's " Death Order." — A Bid for Confeder-
ate Scalps. — A new Interpretation of the War. — The North as a Parasite.— The Foun-
dations of the National Independence of the South. — Present Aspet^ts of the War. —
Its external Condition and Morals. — The Spirit of the South and the Promises of the
Future.

The chief value of history is the moral discoveries it makes.
What is discovered in the records of the old Union and the
events of the present war, of that portion of the American
people commonly known as the Yankees, furnishes not only
food for curiosity, but a valuable ftmd. of philosophy.

In exploring the character and political experience of the
people of the North, much of what is generally thought to be
a confusion of vices may be traced to the peculiar idea that
people have of the nature and offices of government. Their
idea of government may be briefly stated as the sovereignty of
numbers. This conception of political authority is of no late
date with the people of the North ; it came in their blood and
in their traditions for centuries ; it was part of the Puritanical
idea ; it was manifest in the Revolution of 1776 (the issues oi
which were saved by the conservatism of the South) ; and it is
to-day exhibited, in the passionate and despotic populace that
wages war upon the Confederacy.

The peculiarities of this idea of government are very inter-

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 293

esting, and its consequences are visible in every part and fibre
of the society of the North. It excludes all the elements of
virtue and wisdom in the regulation of political authority ; it
regards numbers as the great element of free government ; it
represents a numerical majority as infallible and omnipotent ;
and it gives opportunity to the flattery of demagogues to pro-
claim the divine rights and sagacity of numbers, and to de-
nounce all constitutions which restrict liberty as most un-
righteous inventions.

It is unnecessary to comment at length upon the error and
coarseness of this idea of government. According to the in-
terpretation of the Yankees, the body politic ought simply to
have a political organization to bring out and enforce the will
of the majority ; and such an organization was supposed to be
the general government made by our forefathers. But while
it is unnecessary to discuss the fallacy of this view, it is enter-
taining and instructive to observe the train of demoralization
it introduced into the society of the North and the conse-
quences it involved.

The Northern idea of government was materialistic ; it de-
graded political authority, because it despoiled it of its moral
offices and represented it as an accident determined by a com-
parison of numbers. It destroyed the virtue of minorities ;
compelled them to servile acquiescence ; and explains that
constant and curious phenomenon in much of American poli-
tics— the rapid absorption of minorities after the elections. It
laid the foundations of a despotism more terrible than that of
any single tyrant; destroyed moral courage in the people;
broke down all the barriers of conservatism ; and substituted
the phrase, ^Hhe majority must govern^'''' for the conscience and
justice of society.

This idea, carried out in the early political government of
America, soon attained a remarkable development. This
development was the absurd doctrine of Consolidation. It
denied the rights of the States ; refused to interpret the Union
from the authority of contemporaries, or from the nature of the
circumstances in which it was formed, or from the objects
which it contemplated ; and represented it as a central political
organization to enforce the divine pleasure of a numerical
majority. The Union was thus converted, though with diffi-

29-i THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAK.

cultj, into a remorseless despotism, and the various and con-
flicting interests and pursuits of one of tlie vastest political
bodies in the world were intrusted to the arrogant and reckless
majority of numbers.

The slavery question was the logical and inevitable result of
Consolidation. It is remarkable how many minds in America
Lave proceeded on tlie supposition that this agitation was acci-
dental, and have distracted themselves with the foolish inquiry
why the Yankees assailed the domestic institutions of the South,
while they neglected to attack the similar institutions of Cuba
and Brazil. Tiiese minds do not appreciate the fact that the
slavery agitation was a necessity of the Northern theory of
government. Duty is the correlative of power; and if the
government at Washington in Yankee estimation was a con-
solidated organization, with power to promote the general
welfare by any means it might deem expedient, it was proper
that it should overthrow the hated institution of slavery in
the South. The central government was responsible for its
continuance or existence, in proportion to its power over it.
Under these circumstances, the duty of acting upon the sub-
ject of slavery was imperious, and amounted to a moral ne-
cessity.

But the slavery agitation was not the only remarkable con-
sequence of the Northern idea of the divine rights of ma-
jorities. It may be said that every political maxim of the
North has its practical and selfish application as well as ita
moral and sentimental aspect. The same idea of the power of
numerical majorities that kindled the slavery disputes, gave
birth to the tariff and other schemes of legislation, to make the
Southern minority subservient and profitable to those who were
their masters by the virtue of numbers.

The slavery and tariff issues are singularly associated in
American politics ; for one at least was an important auxiliary
to the other. It was necessary for the Northern peoj^le to
make their numerical power available to rule the Union ; and
as slavery was strictly a sectional interest, it only had to be
made the criterion of the parties at the North to unite this
section and make it master of the Union. When the power of
the North could thus be united, it was easy to carry out its
measures of sectional ambition, encroachment, and aggrandize-

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 295

ment. The liistory of the enoi'mous despotism of Yankee
tariffs is easily snnimed up.

The war of 1812 left the United States with a debt of one
hundred and thirty millions. To provide for the payment of
this debt, heavy duties were laid on foreign goods ; and as in
the exigencies of the war some home manufactures liad sprung
up, whicli were useful and deserving, and which were in dan-
ger of sinking under foreign competition, on the return of peace
it was proposed to regulate the tariff so as to afford them some
assistance. Proteotion was an incidental feature in the tariff
of 1816, and as such was zealously recommended even by John
C. Calhoun, who was a conspicuous advocate of the bill. But
the principle of protection once admitted, maintained its hold
and enlarged its demands. In the tariffs of 1820, '24, and '28,
it was successively carried further ; the demand of the North
for premiums to its manufacturing interests becoming more
exacting and insolent.

In 1831 the public debt had been so far diminished as to
render it certain that, at the existing rate of revenue, in three
years the last dollar would be paid. The government had
been collecting about twice as much revenue as its usual ex-
penditures required, and it was calculated that if the existing
tariff continued in operation, there would be, after three years,
an annual surplus in the treasury of twelve or thirteen millions.
Under these circumstances, the reduction of the tariff was a
plain matter of justice and prudence ; but it was resisted by
the North with brazen defiance. Unfortunately, Mr. Clay was
weak enough to court popularity in the North by legislative
bribes, and it was mainly through his exertions that enough
was saved of the protection principle to satisfy the rapacity of
the Yankee ; for whicli the statesman of Kentucky enjoyed a
brief and indecent triumph in the North.

As an engine of oppression of the South, the tariff did its
work well; for it not only impoverished her, but fixed on her
a badge of inferiority, which was an unfailing mark for Yankee
derision. The South had no great cities. Their growth was
paralyzed, and they were scarcely more than the suburbs of
Northern cities. The agricultural productions of the South
were the basis of the foreign commerce of the United States;
yet Southern cities did not carry it on. The resources of this

296 THE SECOND YKAR OF THE WAR.

■unhappy part of the country were taxed for the henefit of the
Korthern people, and for forty years every tax imposed by
Congress was laid with a view of subserving the interests of
the North.

The blight of such legislation on the South was a source ol
varied gratification to the Yankee; especially that it gave him
the conceit that the South was an inferior. Tlie contrast be-
tween the slow and limited prosperity of the South and the
swift and noisy progress of the North, was never more remark-
able than at the period of the great tariff controversy of 1831-3.
The condition of the country at this time is described by Par-
ton, the Yankee biographer of Andrew Jackson, with flippant
self-complacency. He snjs, :

"The North was rushing on like a "Western high-pressure
steamboat, with rosin in the furnace, and a man on the safety-
valve. All through Western New York, Ohio, Indiana, and
Illinois, the primeval wilderness was vanishing like a mist, and
towns were springing into existence with a rapidity that ren-
dered necessary a new map every month, and spoiled the gazet-
teers as fast as they were printed. The city of New York
began already to feel itself the London of the New World, and
to calculate how many years must elapse before it would be
the London of the world.

"Tiie South meanwhile was depressed and anxious. Cotton
was down, tobacco was down. Corn, wheat, and pork were
down. For several years the chief products of the South had
either been ijiclining downward, or else had risen in price too
slowly to make up for the (alleged) increased price of the com-
modities which the South was compelled to buy. Few new
towns changed the Southern map. Charleston languished, or
seemed to languish, certainly did not keep pace with New York,
Boston, and Philadelphia. No Cincinnati of the South became
the world's talk by the startling rapidity of its growth. No
Southern river exhibited at every bend and coyne of vantage
a rising village. No Southern mind, distracted with the im-
possibility of devising suitable names for a thousand new places
per annum, fell back in despair upon the map of the Ojd World,
and selected at random any convenient name that presented
itself, bestowing upon clusters of log huts such titles as Utica,
Rome, Palermo, Naples, Russia, Egypt, Madrid, Paris, Elba,

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 297

and Berlin. No Southern commissioner, compelled to find
names for a hundred streets at once, had seized upon the letters
of the alphabet and the figures of arithmetic, and called the
avenues A, B, C, and D, and instead of naming his cross streets,
numbered them."

For forty years the Korth reaped the fruits of partial legis-
lation, while the South tasted the bitterness of oppression.
The shoemakers, the iron men, the sailmakers, and the cotton
and woollen spinners in the North, clamored for protection
against their English, Swedish, and Russian competitors, and
easily obtained it. The South paid duties upon all articles
that the tariff kept out of the country; but these duties, in-
stead of going into the treasury as revenue, went into the
purses of manufacturers as bounty. After paying this tribute
money to the North, the South had then to pay her quota for
the support of the government. The North, for there was per-
fect free trade between the States, had a preference over all the
world for its wares in the markets of the South. This prefer-
ence amounted to 20 or 30, or 40 or 50 per cent., and even
more, according to the article and the existing tariflf. It ex-
tended over a country having twelve millions of customers.
The sum of the Yankee profits out of the tariff was thus enor-
mous. Had tlie South submitted to the "Morrill tariff," it
would have exacted from her something like one hundred mil-
lion dollars as an annual tribute to the North. But submission
has some final period, and the South has no longer a lot in the
legislation at AVashington.

In the tariff controversy of 1831-2, we find the premoni-
tions of the present revolution. It is a curious circumstance
that in the excitement of that period some medals were se-
cretly struck, bearing the inscription, '-''John 0. Calhoun^
First President of the Southern Confederacy P The name of
the new power was correctly told. But the times were not
ripe for a declaration of Southern independence, and even the
public opinions of Mr. Calhoun resisted the suggestion of a dis-
solution of the Union.

The " nullification" doctrine of the statesmen of North Caro-
lina, is one of the most interesting political studies of America ;
for it illustrates the long and severe contest in the hearts of the
Southern people between devotion to the Union and the sense

208 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

of wrong and injustice. Mr. Calhoun either did not dare
to offend the popuhir idolatry, or was sincerely attached to the
Union ; but at the same time he was deeply sensible of the
oppression it devolved upon the South. Nullification was
simply an attempt to accommodate these two facts. It pro-
fessed to find a remedy for the grievances of States without
disturbing the Union ; and the nullification of an unconstitu-
tional law within the local jurisdiction of a State, was proposed
as the process for referring the matter to some constitutional
tribunal other than the Supreme Court, whose judgments should
be above all influences of political party. It was a crude
scheme, and only remarkable as a sacrifice to that peculiar
idolatry in American politics which worshipped the name of
the Union.

The present President of the Southern Confederacy — Mr.
Jefferson Davis — has referred to the political principles of Mr.
Calhoun, in some acute remarks made on the interesting occa-
sion of his farewell to the old Senate at AVashington. He sa3'S :

"A great man, who now reposes with his fathers, and who
has often been arraigned for a want of fealty to the Union,
advocated the doctrine of nullification, because it preserved the
Union. It was because of his deep-seated attachment to the
Union, his determination to find some remedy for existing ills
short of a severance of the ties which bound South Carolina to
the other States, that Mr. Calhoun advocated the doctrine of
nullification, which he proclaimed to be peaceful ; to be within
the limits of State power, not to disturb the Union, but only to
be the means of bringing the agent before the tribunal of
the States for their judgment."

In defending, in the speech referred to, the action of the
State of Mississippi in separating herself from the Union, Mr.
Davis remarks with justice, that Secession belongs to another
class of remedies than that ]3roposed by the great South Caro-
linian. The Kentucky and Virginia resolutions of 1798, long
the political text of the South, bore the seeds of the present
revolution, for they laid the foundation for the right of seces-
sion in the sovereignty of the States ; and Mr. Calhoun's de-
duction from them of his doctrine of nullification was narrow
and incomplete.

But we shall not renew here vexed political questions. We

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR, 299

liave referred at some length to the details of the old United
States' tariffs and the incidental controversies of parties, be-
cause we shall find here a peculiar development of tlie political
ideas of the North. To all the ingenious philosopli)' of State
rights ; to the disquisitions of Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Tyler ; to
the discussions of the moral duties of the government, the
North had but one invariable reply, and that Avas the sover-
eignty of the will of the majority. It recognized no sovereign
but numbers, and it was thought to be a sufhcient defence of
the tariff and other legislation unequal to the South, that it was
the work and the will of the majority.

It was during the agitation of the tariff that the consolida-
tion school became firmly established. Mr. Webster, the
mouth-piece of the manufacturing interest in the North, at-
tempted by expositions of the Constitution to represent the
government as a central organization of numbers, without any
feature of originality to distinguish it from other rude democ-
racies of the world. In his attempt to simplify it, he degraded
it to the common-place of simple democracy, and insulted the
wisdom of those who had made it. The political opinions of
Mr. Webster were summed up in what he arrogantly called
" Four Exhaustive Propositions." These propositions were fa-
mous in the newspapers of his day, and may be reproduced
here as a very just summary of the political ideas of the North.

MR. Webster's four exhaustive propositions.

1. "That the Constitution of the United States is not a
league, confederacy, or compact between the people of the
several States in their sovereign capacity ; but a government
founded on the adoption of the people, and creating direct re-
lations between itself and individuals."

2. "That no State authority has power to dissolve these re-
lations ; that nothing can dissolve them but revolution ; and
that, consequently, there can be no such thing as secession
without revolution."

3. " That there is a supreme law, consisting of the Consti-
tution of the United States, acts of Congress passed in pur-
suance of it, and treaties ; and that in cases not capable of as-
suming the character of a suit in law or equity, Congress must

300 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

judge of, and finally interpret this supreme law, as often as it
has occasion to pass acts of legislation ; and in cases capable
of assuming the character of a suit, the Supreme Court of the
United States is the first interpreter."

4. " That the attempt by a State to abrogate, annul, or nul-
lify an act of Congress, or to arrest its operation within her
limits, on the ground that, in her opinion, such law is uncon-
etitutional, is a direct usurpation on the just powers of the
general government, and on the equal rights of other States ;
a plain violation of the Constitution ; and a proceeding essen-
tially revolutionary in its character and tendency."

It is in the light of these propositions that the present as-
sertion of the independence of the South is denounced by the
ITorth as rebellion. And it is with reference to them and
their savage doctrine of the power of numbers in a union of
sovereign States, that we may in turn challenge the world to
declare if the South in this struggle is not enlisted in the cause
of free government, which is more important to the world than
" the Union," which has disappeared beneath the wave of
history.

In the present war the North has given faithful and constant
indications of its dominant idea of the political sovereignty, as
well as the military omnipotence of numbers. It is absurd to
refer to the person of Abraham Lincoln as the political master
of the North ; he is the puppet of the vile despotism that rules
by brute numbers. We have already referred to some of the
characteristics of such despotism. We shall see others in this
war, in the timidity and subservient hesitation to which such a
government reduces party minorities, and in that destitution of
honor which invariably characterizes the many-headed despot-
ism of the people.

Mr. Lincoln was elected on a principle of deadly antagonism
to the social order. His party found him subservient to their
passions, and with the President in the hollow of their hand,
for two years the}'- have reigned triumphantly in the Congress
at Washington. Such has been the stupendous lunacy and
knavery of this body, that it will be regarded in all coming
time as a blotch on civilization and a disgrace to the common
humanity of the age.

There are some minds in the South which are preiudiced by

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAE. 301

the impression that the power of the Lineohi party was broken
by the fall elections of 1862 ; that it has lost the majority oi
numbers in the North ; and that thereby the despotism which
we have described as characteristic of the North is rapidly
approaching the period of its dissolution or an era of reaction.
But this reply to oar theory does not take into account all the
facts. The liepublican party in the North still has the
majority of force — a majority more dangerous and appalling
than that of numbers, as it finds more numerous objects of
revenge among its own people.

The Yankee Congress rejected at the polls has taken fearful
revenge on the people who ventured an opinion hostile to the
ruling dynasty. They have passed the bank, conscription,
and habeas corpus suspension bills, thus placing every life and
every dollar, and, indeed, every right of twenty millions of
freeborn people at the absolute mercy of Abraham Lincoln.
They have abated none of their legislation against tlie interests
of humanity and the written and unwritten law of civilization
in this war. They have added to it. They are organizing
insurrections in South Carolina ; they have sent a negro army
into Florida; they are organizing black regiments in Tennessee.
But a few months ago the infamous law was passed at Wash-
ington known as " the Plunder Act," in which the Secretary
of the Treasury was authorized to appoint agents to go South,
collect all property, send it North, and have it sold. In
diflerent parts of the Confederacy the Yankee troops are now
destroying all farming implements, seizing all provisions, and
preventing the planting of crops, with the avowed determina-
tion of starving the Southern people into submission. Such a
warfare contemplates the extermination of women and children
as well as men, and proposes to inflict a revenge more terrible
than the tortures of savages and the modern atrocities of the
Sepoys.

It is, perhaps, not greatly to be wondered at that a people
like the Yankees should show a brutal rage in warfare upon
an enemy who has chastised their insolence and exasperated
their pride, and that they should therefore be generally ready
to give their adliesion to any train of measures calculated for
revenge upon the South. But it is a matter of grave and
solicitous inquiry that this people should so easily tolerate

302 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

measures in the government which have been })lain]y directed
against their own liberties, and which, while they have been
applauding a " vigorous prosecution of the war," have estab-
lished a savage despotism at home. It is yet more remarkable
that the erection of this despotism should be hailed with a cer-
tain apphause by its own victims. History has some instances
of the servile and unnatural joj^s of a people in the surrender
of their liberties; but none grosser than that in which has
been inaugurated the throne of Abraham Lincoln at Wash-
ington.

There are numerous examples in history where great abilities
or some scattered virtues in the character of a despot have won
the flattery of minds not ignoble and unconscious of their
humiliation. Milton in his Latin superlatives spoke of Crom-
well very much after the same manner in which Mr. Lincoln
is spoken of in Yankee vernacular. Eiirifi te agnoscunt omnes^
Cromxielle, ea tu civis maximus et gloriosissimus^ dux publici
consilii, exe?'citum; fortissimoruTn imperato7\ pater jpatria
gessisH. But the Western lawyer and tavern-jester is not a
Cromwell. 'No attractions of genius are to be found in the
personal composition of Abraham Lincoln. His person in fact
is utterly unimportant. He holds tlie reins for a higlier power ;
and that power is the many-headed monster of Fanaticism,
which by numbers or by force constrains the popular will and
rules with the rod of iron.

The disposition generally of the Northern people to submit
to or tolerate the assaults of the Washington government on
their own liberties and the destruction of their civil rights,
must proceed from permanent and well-defined causes. We
have already hinted in these pages an explanation of this ser-
vile acquiescence in the acts of the government. It is doubt-
less the fruit of the false political education in the North, that
gives none other but materialistic ideas of government, and
inculcates the virtue of time-serving with all political majori-
ties. It is to be attributed to the demoralization of the Yan-
kee ; to tlie servile habit of his mind ; to his long practice of
submission to the wild democracy of numbers, — all proceeding
from that false idea of government which recognizes it only as
the organ of an aocidental party, and not as a self-existent
principle of right and virtue. It is a melancholy fact that the

THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAR. 303

people of the North have long ceased to love or to value lib-
erty. They have ceased to esteem tlie political virtues ; to
take any account of the moral elements of government; or to
look upon it else than as a physical power, to be exercised at
the pleasure of a party, and to be endured until reversed by
the accident of numbers.

The superficial political education of the people of the North
explains much that is curious in their society. Time-serving
of power gave them wealth, while it degraded their national
character. In the old government they easily surrendered their
political virtue for tariffs, bounties, &c. ; and the little left of
it is readily sacrificed on the devilish altars of this war. Their
habit of material computation made them boastful of a " civili-
zation" untouched by the spirits of virtue and humanity, con-
sisting only of the rotten, material things which make up the
externals and conveniences of life, and the outer garments of so-
ciety. Their wealth was blazed out in arts and railroads ; com-
mon schools, the nurseries of an insolent i«:norance ; and gilded
churches, the temples of an impure religion. No people has
ever established more decisively the fact of the worthlessness
of what remains of " civilization," when the principle of liberty
is subtracted, or more forcibly illustrated how much of phos-
phorescent rottenness there is in such a condition.

" Tlieir mucli-loved wealth imparts
Convenience, plenty, elegance, and arts ;
But view tliem closer, craft and fraud appear.
Even liberty itself is bartered here ;
At gold's superior charms all freedom flies.
The needy sell it and the rich man buys ;
A land of tyrants and a den of slaves."

The present war has sufficiently demonstrated the mistake of
the North in the measure of its civilization, and convinced the
world that much of what it esteemed its former strength was
" but plethoric ill." It has done more than this, for it has un-
masked the moral nature of the Yankee. It has exposed to
the detestation of the world a character which is the product
of materialism in politics and materialism in religion — the
spawn of the worship of power and the lust of gain. The
Yankee — who has followed up an extravagance of bluster by
the vilest exhibitions of cowardice — who has falsified his prate

304 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

of humanity by the deeds of a savage — who, in the South, has
been in this war a robber, an assassin, a thief in tlie night, and
at home a slave fawning on the hand that manacles him — has
secured for himself the everlasting contempt of the world. The
characteristics of a people who boasted themselves the most
Enlightened of Christian nations, are seen in a castrated civili-
sation ; while the most remarkable qualities they have dis-
played in the war are illustrated by the coarse swagger and
drunken fumes of such men as Butler, and the rouged lies of
Buch " military authorities" as Halleck and Hooker.

All vestiges of constitutional liberty have long ago been
lost in the North. The very term of " State rights" is men-
tioned with derision, and the States of the North have ceased
to be more than geographical designations. No trace is left of
the old political system but in the outward routine of the gov-
ernment. The Constitution of the United States is but " the
skin of the immolated victim," and the forms and ceremonies
of a republic are the disguises of a cruel and reckless des-
potism.

During the two miserable and disastrous years that Mr. Lin-
coln has held the presidency of the United States, he has made
the institutions of his country but a name. The office of presi-
dent is no longer recognized in its republican simplicity ; it ia
overlaid with despotic powers, and exceeds in reality the most
famous imperial titles. Not a right secured by the Constitution
but has been invaded ; not a principle of freedom but has been
overthrown ; not a franchise but has been trampled under foot.
The infamous '' death order" published by Burnside, more
bloody than the Draconian penalty and more cruel than the
rude decrees of the savage, is without a parallel in the domes-
tic rule, or in the warfare of any people making the feeblest
pretence to civilization. It assigns the penalty of death to
*' writers of letters sent by secret mails," and to all persons
who " feed, clothe, or in any manner aid" the soldiers of the
Confederacy. This infamous decree will live in history ; it is
already associated with a memorable martyrdom — that of
Clement Vallandigham.

It is remarkable that the North finds great difficulty in as-
signing to the world the objects of the present mad and inhu-
man war. The old pretences made by the Yankees of fighting

THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR. 305

for a constitutional Union, and contesting the cause of free
government for the world, are too absurd and disgusting to be
repeated. They are unwilling to admit that they are lighting
for revenge, and prosecuting a war, otherwise hopeless, for the
gratification of a blind and fanatical hate. They have re-
cently changed the political phrases of the war, and the latest
exposition of its object is, that the North contends for " the life
of the nation." If this means that a parasite is struggling for
existence, and that the North desires the selfish aggrandize-
ments of the Union, and its former tributes to its wealth, we
shall not dispute the theory. But the plain question occurs,
what right has the North to constrain the association of a
people who have no benefit to derive from the partnership, and
who, by the laws of nature and society, are free to consult their
own happiness ? The North has territory and numbers and
physical resources enough for a separate existence, and if she
has not virtue enough to sustain a national organization, she
has no right to seek it in a compulsory union with a people
who, sensible of their superior endowments, have resolved to
take their destinies in their own hands.

There is one sense, indeed, in which association with the
South does imply the national welfare of the North. The
South gave to the old government all its ideas of statesman-
ship ; it leavened the political mass with its characteristic con-
servatism ; and it combated, and, to some extent, controlled
the brutal theory that represented numbers as the element of
free government. The revolutionary and infidel society of the
North was moderated by the piety and virtues of the South,
and the old national life was in some degree purified by the
political ideas and romantic character of that portion of the
country now known as the Confederacy. It is in this sense
that the Southern element is desirable to the North, and that
the Union involves " the life of the nation ;" and it is precisely
in the same sense that an eternal dissociation and an independ-
ent national existence are objects to the South not only of de-
sire, but of vital necessity.

We can never go back to the embraces of the North. There
is blood and leprosy in the touch of our former associate. We
can never again live with a people who have made of this war
a huge assassination ; who have persecuted us with savage and

20

306 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR.

cowardly hate ; who gloat over the fancies of starving women
and children ; who have appealed to the worst passions of the
black heart of the negro to take revenge upon us ; and who,
not satisfied with the emancipation proclamation and its scheme
of servile insurrection, have actually debated in their State
Legislatures the policy of paying negroes premiums for the
murder of white families in the South.*

While we congratulate ourselves on the superiority of our
political ideas over those of the North, and the purer life of
our society, we do not forget that, although we have carried
away much less of the territory and numbers of the old Union
than have been left to our enemy, we still have a sufficiency of
the material elements of a national existence.

The South has attempted to lay the foundations of national
independence, with a territory as great as the whole of Europe,
with the exception of Russia and Turkey ; with a population
four times that of the continental colonies ; and with a capacity
for commerce equivalent to nearly four-fifths of the exports of
the old Union.

It is only necessary to glance at the contemporary aspects of
the war to reassure our confidence in its destiny, and to renew
our vows upon its altars. The hope of reconstruction is a van-
ity of the enemy. To mobocratic Yankees ; to New England

* The following is taken from an Abolition pamphlet (1863), entitled " In-
teresting Debate," etc., in the Senate of Pennsylvania. It is characteristic of
the blasphemous fanaticism of the Yankee and his hideous lust for blood :

" Mr. LowRT — I believed then and novr that He who watches over the spar-
row will chastise us untU we will be just towards ourselves and towards four
millions of God's poor, down-cast prisoners of war. I said that I would arm
the negro — that I would place him in the front of battle — and that I would
invite his rebel master with his stolen arms to shoot his stolen ammunition
into his stolen property at the rate of a thousand dollars a shot, I said further,
that were I commander-in-chief, by virtue of the war power and in obedience
to the customs of civilized nations, and in accordance veith the laws of civilized
nations, I would confiscate every rebel's property, whether upon two legs or
four, and that I would give to the slave who would bring me his master's dis-
loyal scalp one hvindred and sixty acres of his master's plantation ; nor would
I be at all exacting as to where the scalp was taken off", so that it was at some
point between the bottom of the ears and the top of the loins. This, sir, was
my language long before Fremont had issued his immortal proclamation. The
logic of events is sanctifying daily these anointed truths. Father, forgive thou
those who deride and vilify me, because I enunciated them : they know not
what they do."

THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR. 307

" majorities ;" to the base crews of Infidelity and Abolitionism ;
to the savages who have taken upon their souls the curse of
fratricidal blood and darkened an age of civilization with unut-
terable crime and outrage, the South can never surrender, giv-
ing up to such a people their name, their lands, their wealth,
their traditions, their glories, their heroes newly dead, their
victories, their hopes of the future. Such a fate is morally im-
possible. "We have not paid a great price of life for nothing.
"We have not forgotten our dead. The flower of our youth and
the strength of our manhood have not gone down to the grave
in vain. "We are not willing for the poor boon of a life dishon-
ored and joyless to barter our liberties, surrender our homes to
the spoiler, exist as the vassals of Massachusetts, or become
exiles, whose title to pity will not exceed the penalty of con-
tempt. Any contact, friendly or indifferent, with the Yankee,
since the display of his vices, would be painful to a free and
enlightened people. It would be vile and unnatural to the
people of the South if extended across the bloody gulf of a
cruel war, and unspeakably infamous if made in the attitude of
submission.

APPENDIX.

I.

THE SEVEN DAYS' CONTESTS.
June 25 — July 1, 1862.

{By a Prussian Officer in the Confederate Army.)

Upon the approach of the terrible Union armada we were
forced to abandon our position on the peninsula at Yorktown,
and after we had partially spiked our guns we drew back to
our defensive fastness at Williamsburg, so as at that point to
cover our capital, Richmond, by throwing up strong fortified
works, and perfecting a compact military formation. McClel-
lan, the commanding general of the Union troops, did not al-
low himself to be so far deceived by our voluntary withdrawal
from our position at Yorktown as to regard us a beaten army,
but with great celerity and skill continued the disembarkation
of his troops, and began to fortify his position. It was not
until he had completed his preliminary measures that he ad-
vanced with hostile demonstrations against our line. The lines
at "Williamsburg were also given up by us without any great
resistance, although it was very difficult to persuade the old
fighting Gen. Magruder of the propriety of the step, for he
loved the position as a father loves his child ; and, to tell the
truth, all the fortifications had been constructed with mucli
talent under his personal directions. The hard-headed old
soldier was won over only after renewed debate and expostula-
tion. At length, however, after a few cavalry affairs, the place
was evacuated by our troops, and we took up our march, in
two columns, for Richmond. In the mean while the most fear-
ful panic fell upon Richmond, and all who could possibly get
away packed up every thing they had and fled southward.

310 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

The nearer tlie hostile army approached the city the fiercer the
tumult and uproar became. The burning waves of popular
alarm could not be stayed. The government itself furthered
the confusion. Instead of resolving to triumph or to fall with
the anny in front of Richmond, it at once ordered all the
different bureaux to pack up, and caused the oflScers of ord-
nance to empty their magazines, and convey their stores further
south. Even President Davis took to the road and hastened,
with his wife and children, to North Carolina. As may be
readily divined, this loss of presence of mind threw the people
at larffe into the most frantic excess of terror. There was noth-
ing on all sides but shouting and uproar, and confusion reached
its utmost height. The secret police of Gen. Winder had lost
all control. The civil authorities of Richmond were anxious
to do something, but knew not what, and also lost their senses.
A small imniber of the Baltimore rabble took advantage of the
hubbub, and, in public meeting, passed resolutions condemning
Richmond to conflagration as soon as the Union troops should
enter it. Yet all who could escape did so. The sick and
the wounded were carried further into the interior; many
public and private buildings were marked out for destruction ;
and, in short, a frightful catastrophe seemed to be impending
over the Southern capital.

At this most critical moment the General-in-chief command-
ing our forces (Johnston) was wounded at the battle of Seven
Pines, and the command fell into the able hands of Gen. Lee,
who was exactly the man to bring quiet and order again out
of this unreasonable chaos. He went to work with great zeal
and energy to discharge his onerous task. All disposable
troops were hastilj' summoned from the interior ; Gen. Stone-
wall Jackson's army corps was ordered to Richmond ; all the
hospitals were cleared of their occupants, and preparations
made for ten thousand wounded men ; artillery and ammuni-
tion wagons rattled by day and night through the streets,
while aids and orderlies galloped to and fro in wild hurry-
skurry with their dispatches.

Masses of troops came pouring in daily, yes, hourly, but
without music or any other military pomp. Sternly and
silently these ragged, half-starved swarms of men moved on-
ward through the thoroughfares, but the fire in their eyea

APPENDIX. 311

showed that they were determined to defend their freedom or
to perish.

On the 25th of June another great council of war was held.
In it were assembled nearly all that was eminent in the Con-
federate army. There stood like a rock Gen. Lee, gazing cheer-
fully over the countenances of his comrades, for each of whom
he had a j)art already assigned. Thoughtfully his eyes wander-
ed from one to the other, as though he wished to stamp the
features of each upon his memory, with the feeling that he,
perhaps, should never behold many of them again. Close be-
side him towered the knightly form of Gen. Baldwin ; at his
left leaned pensively Stonewall Jackson, the idol of his troops,
impatiently swinging his sabre to and fro, as though the quiet
room were too nari'ow for him, and he were longing to be once
more at the head of his columns. A little aside quietly stood the
two Hills, arm in arm, while in front of them old Gen. Wise was
energetically speaking. Further to the right stood Generals
Huger, Longstreet, Branch, Anderson, Whiting, Ripley, and
Magruder in a group. When all these generals had assembled.
Gen. Lee laid his plans before them, and in a few stirring
words pointed out to each his allotted task. The scheme had
already been elaborated. It was compact, concentrated action,
and the result could not fail to be brilliant.

When the conference terminated, all shook hands and
hastened away to their respective army corps, to enter upon
immediate activity.

Now, in looking at the positions of the two armies, it will
be seen that unquestionably the advantage was with the South-
ern host; for Gen. McClellan had his forces necessarily on
both sides of the Chickahominy, and, owing to the many ra-
vines in his neighborhood, could not, without great difficulty
and much loss of time, execute his military movements. His
front line reached over a distance of more than twenty miles,
in the form of a semicircle, extending from the James river
towards Richmond and Ashland. While one part of his army
crossed the Chickahominy, he took position with the main
body on the north side of the river, from Meadow bridge to
Bottom bridge. The heights on the banks of the stream were
fortified, so that his army, notwithstanding the great length of
its lines, had excellent defensive cover.

312 THE SECOND TEAR OF THK WAR.

On the 26tli of June, in the morning, our troops took np
their positions. Jackson hastened bj forced marches to Ash-
land, there to commence his out-flanking operations against
the enemy. Having arrived there, his advanced guard drove
in the weakly posted foe, and pushed on without loss of time
to Hanover Court-house, where he threw forward Gen. Branch's
brigade, between the Chickahominj and Pamunkey rivers, to
establish a junction with Gen. Hill (first), who had to cross the
stream at Meadow bridge Gen. Hill very gallantly opened
the offensive, and began his operations against the little town
of Mechanicsville. The enemy who were stationed here made
a brave resistance. Storming attacks were made again and
again, with a fury, and as often repelled with a cool determi-
nation that awakened admiration. In vain did Gen. Hill send
his aids in quest of Gen. Branch. The latter had encountered
so many topographical difficulties that he reached his position
in front of Mechanicsville only late at night, when the conflict
was at an end. The morning of the 27th had scarcely begun
to dawn ere our artillery opened a tremendous fire upon the
enemy's front, so that the latter, when they also saw Branch's
brigade advancing to the attack on their right, abandoned their
position at Mechanicsville, and fell back, fighting upon their
second defensive line, further down the stream. Just at the
moment when we had established the crossing of the Chick-
ahominy, arrived Gen. Longstreet's magnificent army corps —
old, experienced veterans of the Army of the Potomac — and
the division of Gen. Hill (second). At once the order to ad-
vance was given all along the line. The divisions of Gens. Hill
^ (second), Anderson, and Wliiting formed the centre, and moved
towards Coal Harbor, while Jackson, Hill (first), and Long-
street formed the left, and marched down along the bank of
the river. Magruder, commanding the right wing, was, on ac-
count of the swampy nature of the ground he occupied, ordered
to hold himself merely on the defensive. Gen. Wise took com-
mand of Fort Darling, on the James river. All these military
ofi'ensive operations, and the two preceding fights, must have
given Gen. McClellan knowledge of our intention to change
our inconvenient position at Richmond, and to procure for our-
selves more space and freedom of motion. He should, then,
have instantly ordered the army corps of McDowell, which for

APPENDIX. 313

four months had lain inactive at Fredencksbnrg, to make a
demonstration along the Richmond road. By such a move-
ment even the flank march of Gen. Jackson would have been
rendered impracticable. But Gen. McClellan must have been
deceived in the character of Gen. McDowell ; for, notwith-
standing all the communications in reference to our combined
manoeuvres, the latter remained with imperturbable indif-
ference in his secure position, and left Gen. McClellan's army,
which had suffered greatly by sickness and desertion, a prey
to the heavy concussions of our attack. Scarcely, thei'efore,
had Gen. Lee received reliable intelligence of McDoAvell's
inactivity, than a general and simultaneous attack on McCel-
lan's whole line was resolved upon. So soon, then, as the ar-
rival of Gen. Jackson at Coal Harbor was reported, the Com-
mander-in-chief, with his staff, repaired to Gaines's Mill, and
ordered the divisions of Anderson, Hill (first), Longstreet, and
Picket to attack. Before these columns got into motion, the
thunder of artillery at our left announced that Gen. Jackson
was already at work. This called forth in our troops the ut-
most enthusiasm.

Gen. McClellan's position on that day was remarkable in the
highest degree. With one portion of his troops he had crossed
to the south side of the Chickahominy, and there confronted
Magruder, while, with the larger portion of his force, he had
taken up a position more to the rear and nearer to the railroadj
where he was resolved to accept bat'tle. His dispositions re-
vealed comprehensive forethought, talent, and coolness. The
different divisions of his army took their positions with admi-
rable precision and awaited our onset with firmness. It was
the first time that the two hostile armies had, in relation to
numbers, confronted one another with force so nearly equal ;
but the Unionists had the advantage of a better protected po-
sition, while our troops had to expose themselves to the hostile
fire. The attack was opened by the columns of Hill (fii'st),
Anderson, and Pickett. These gallant masses rushed forward
with thundering hurras upon the musketry of the foe, as though
it were a. joy to them. Whole ranks went down under that
terrible hail, but nothing could restrain their courage. The
billows of battle raged fiercely onward ; the struggle was man
to man, eye to eye, bayonet to bayonet. The hostile Meagher's

314 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK.

brigade, composed chieflj of Irishmen, offered heroic resistance.
After a fierce struggle our people began to give way, and at
length all orders and encouragements were vain — they were
falling back in the greatest disorder. Infuriate, foaming at the
mouth, bare headed, sabre in hand, at this critical moment Gen.
Cobb appeared upon the field, at the head of his legion, and
with him the Nineteenth North Carolina and Fourteenth Yir-
ginia regiments. At once these troops renewed the attack, but
all their devotion and self-sacrifice were in vain. The Irish
held their position with a determination and ferocity that called
forth the admiration of our own officers. Broken to pieces and
disorganized, the fragments of that fine legion came rolling
back from the charge. The ISTineteenth North Carolina lost
eight standard-bearers, and the most of their staff-officers were
either killed or wounded. Again, Generals Hill (first) and
Anderson led their troops to the attack, and some regiments
covered themselves with immortal glory. Our troops exhib-
ited a contempt of death that made them the equals of old,
experienced veterans ; for, notwithstanding the bloody harvest
the destroyer rea]3ed in our ranks that day, no disorder, no
timid bearing revealed that "many of the regiments were under
fire and smelt gunpowder then for the first time. But the en-
emy, nevertheless, quietly and coolly held out against every
attack we made, one after the other. Notwithstanding the fact
that solitary brigades had to stand their ground from four until
eight o'clock p. m., they performed feats of incredible valor ;
and it was only when the news came that Jackson was upon
them in the rear, that about eight they retired before our ad-
vance. Despite the dreadful carnage in their ranks, they
marched on with streaming banners and rolling drums, and
carried with them all their slightly wounded and all their- bag-
gage ; and, when the cavalry regiments of Davies and Wick-
ham went in pursuit, repelled this assault also with perfect
coolness.

By this time night had come on, and overspread the field of
death with darkness, compassionately shutting out from the
eyes of the living the horrid spectacle of slaughter. Quiet
gradually returned. Only a feeble cannonade could be heard
upon our farthest left, and that too, little by little, died away.
The soldiers were so fearfully exhausted by the day's struggle

APPENDIX. 315

that many of them sank down from their places in the ranks
upon the ground. Although I, too, could scarcely keep in the
saddle, so great was my fatigue, I hastened with one of my
aids to that quarter of the field where the struggle had raged
the most fiercely. The scene of ruin was horrible. Whole ranks
of the enemy lay prone where they had stood at the beginning
of the battle. The number of wounded was fearful, too, and
the groans and imploring cries for help that rose on all sides
had, in the obscurity of the night, a ghastly efi*ect that froze
the blood in one's veins. Although I had been upon so many
battle-fields in Italy and Hungary, never had my vision beheld
such a spectacle of human destruction. The preparations for
the transportation of the wounded were too trifling, and the
force detailed for that purpose was either too feeble in numbers
or had no proper knowledge of its duties. Even the medical
corps had, by the terrors of the situation, been rendered in-
capable of attending to the wounded with zeal and efficiency.
"With inconceivable exertion I at length succeeded, with the
assistance of some humane officers, in bringing about some
kind of order amid this frightful confusion. By the happiest
chance, I found some Union ambulances, had all our men who
could drive and knew the way pressed into service, and set to
work to get the wounded into Richmond. A most heart-rend-
ing task it was ; for often the poor sufferer would expire just
as we were about to extend him succor. By midnight we had
got the first train ready. It consisted of sixty wagons, with
two hundred seriously wounded. I cautiously and slowly con-
ducted this train with success to the city. The first hospital
reached I was met with refusal. "All full," was the reply to
my inquiry. " Forward to the next hospital," was my word
of command. "All full," was again the answer. Just then a
friend said to me that if I would wait he might be able to help
me, as he would have a neighboring tenement, used as a to-
bacco warehouse, prepared for a hospital. So I had to make
up my mind to wait there an hour and a half in the street
with my dying charge. I did my best to supply the poor fel-
lows with water, tea, and other refreshments, so as to alleviate
their sufferings in some degree ; but the late hour of the night
and the agitation of tlie city prevented me from putting my
design into more than half execution.

316 THE SECOND TEAK OF THE WAR.

At lengtli the so-called hospital was ready; but I could
scarcely believe my eyes when I saw the dismal hole offered
me by that name. There, in open lofts, without windows or
doors, a few planks nailed together were to be the beds of the
unfortunate defenders of our country. During those days of
fate the soldier had endured all things — hunger, thirst, heat.
Nothing could rob him of his courage, his indifference to death,
&,nd now he lay there wounded to the death at the door of his
friends, whose property he had defended, for whose welfare he
had exposed his life ; and these friends turn him away to an
open barn, where, without dressing for his wounds or any care,
he is left to perish.

And yet this city had a population of forty thousand souls,
had churches admirably adapted to conversion into hospitals,
had clergymen in numbers ; but neither the doors of the
churches opened, nor were the ministers of the gospel there to
sweeten the last moments of the dying soldier. Sad and dis-
pirited, I gave the order to carry in the wounded, cast one
more glance at that house of death and horror, and then
swung mj'-self into my saddle and fled, with a quiet oath on.
my lips, back to my regiment. '

Gen, Jackson had accomplished his flanking march without
meeting with important resistance from the enemy. Hardly
had he arrived at the positions marked out for him, ere he sent
his columns to the charge. Notwithstanding the difficulties
and exertions of the march, which they had executed on short
allowance, he hurled his troops — those desperate sans culottes
of his — upon the Federals. In vain was all the courage, all
the bold manoeuvring of the enemy. Like a tempest, Gen.
Stuart and his cavalry swept down upon them and hurled
every thing to the earth that stood in his way. A genuine
fury took possession of Jackson's men, who, throwing aside
their muskets, and drawing their terrible bowie-knives, fell
with these alone upon the victims offered up to them. Hor-
rible was the carnage that then ensued, and although the Feder-
als had at flrst made obstinate resistance, they now lost ground
and fell back, throwing away arms, knapsacks, blankets — in
fine, every thing that could impede their fiight. Subordina-
tion and discipline were at an end. The soldier no longer

APPENDIX. 817

heard the command of his officer, and deserted the post in-
trusted to his keeping. Already had two generals of the four
hostile brigades been left by their men^ and it was believed
that all was over with McClellan's entire army, when at this
perilous crisis. Gen. Heintzelman appeared with his division,
and again brought the battle to a stand. With great ability
and gallantry he repulsed the onset of our troops, and at once
ordered the organizatjion of the beaten and fugitive brigades ;
but it was found impossible to restore order to these confused
and intimidated masses. They bore their officers along with
them, and rushed away in wild disordered flight.

Gen. Heintzelman saw himself compelled to abandon his
position, and, like an ox, with head down and ready to receive
attack at any moment, he drew slowly back to the Chicka-
hominy. All the wounded and all the accumulated stores of
the enemy fell into our hands, and Jackson could, with a clear
conscience, issue the order : " Enough for to-day." None of
the other generals had jperformed their task with such rapidity
and success as he, and therefore the fruits of his victory were
unusually large. The Unionists had lost during the day two bri-
gadier-generals, one hundred and fifteen staff and subaltern offi-
cers, three thousand privates, and twenty-one cannon, and hun-
dreds of ambulances and baggage-wagons with all their lading.
The booty was immense ; but, in a strategic point of view,
Jackson's success was of far greater importance, since it cut
Gen. McClellan off completely from his base of retreat. When,
therefore, the triumph of Jackson's arms became known at
head-quarters, all counted with perfect certainty upon the de-
struction or capture of McClellan's entire force. The rejoicing
bordered on frenzy, and when, early next morning, I rejoined
my regiment, I found my poor fellows in a state of feverish ex-
citement, for every man of them wanted to have a hand in the
approaching capture or annihilation of the great Federal army.
I alone shrugged my shoulders as my officers communicated
their anticipations on the subject. We had gone through a
similar experience in 184:8, under Radetzky, in Italy. There,
too, the Italians had already prepared quarters for the old man
and his troops, and the mayor of Milan was so firmly confident
of victory and its consequences that he hurried out to meet the

318 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

gray old hero a prisoner, at the very moment when the latter,
overcoming all difficulties, was quietly withdrawing into his
fortresses at Mantua and Yerona.

I had but just reached my regiment when we received the
order to advance along the whole line. I looked with sadness
upon our once fine division. How fearfully some regiments
had been decimated ! Many which, like my own, had marched
out with eleven hundred men, had now but three or four hun-
dred effective soldiers left. Yes, some — for instance, the Seventh
Georgia and Twenty-first ITorth Carolina — had only something
over one hundred and eighty men. A vast number of officers
were disabled, and many a fine fellow who, a few days before,
full of confidence and jollity, had prophesied a golden future,
was no more. I no longer had the courage to ask for this one
or that one whom I did not see, but took it for granted that he
had fallen on the field of honor — it was too sad to always hear
the same response, "He is dead," " he fell here," or " there,"
in such and such a way.

As our divisions were getting into motion, suddenly ap-
peared the President, Jefferson Davis, surrounded by the Genera]
of Cavalry, Joseph Davis, and Messrs. Johnston and Smith,
followed by Secretary of War Randolph, and his military
Cabinet. Now when the danger was over, when Richmond
had been free from the iron yoke placed upon her neck by the
encircling army of the foe, and when they began again to
breathe freely within their walls, these parlor heroes could, at
last, at the close of the bloody struggle, assume a theatrical
attitude. Yet, with no hurrah, as of yore, did the soldiers re-
ceive the conqueror of Buena Yista. With a cold eye and as
stiff as his horse he rode along the front of the regiments, only
once in a while addressing a word to some friend.

When our division had successfully worked its way out from
among the labyrinths of dismounted artillery, shattered wagons,
and dead and wounded soldiers, and got room for freer movement,
we opened our eyes wide with astonishment, when, on reach-
ing the positions evacuated by the enemy, we found nothing
but a few stands of arms and some baggage. All their material
had been carried off by them in this part of the field, and only
a huge number of dead told how fearfully the battle had raged
at this point. The fortifications were of colossal dimensions,

APPENDIX. 319

and had far greater solidity than we had supposed. "\Ve at
once received orders to pursue the foe immediately, or at least
so soon as we could ascertain his exact whereabouts. We had
hardly got beyond "White House when we descried a huge
cloud of smoke which eddied above the woods about a mile and
a half to our right. As we carefully advanced in that direction
we perceived a high heaped-up pyramid briskly burning with
a red-hot glow, and sending forth volumes of steam. The hos-
tile general had given orders to commit all the property that
could not be carried away to the flames, and here the eager
conquerors were robbed of millions of dollars' worth of booty.
Like hungry wolves my poor fellows rushed towards the huge
glowing heap to save whatever could yet be saved. There
were hundreds of casks of meat, coffee, sugar, molasses, rice,
wine, even champagne — in fine, all those delicacies with which
the Northern army was more than abundantly pr<jvided, and
which we poor devils scarcely knew the names of, piled up on
one another. Yet all our efforts to rescue something useful
were vain ; the enemy had taken his precautions for the total
destruction of every thing left behind with such cunning skill,
that there was nothing remaining but spoiled and useless goods.
On the other hand, the entire field was covered with the heavy
cloth cloaks of the fugitives, and these were very welcome to
our troops. Yet all essential particulars proved to me that
General McClellan had accomplished his retreat with order
and sagacity, and that there was nothing further from his
thoughts than a surrender of the army. Indeed, from some
stragglers captured by my men, I learned tliat he had crossed
the Chickahominy with his entire force, had given up his
former base of retreat, and was now approaching the James
river, probably with a view to form a junction with the fleet.
I at once sent an officer with the intelligence to Gen. Lee.
Hereupon I received orders to halt, and presently there rushed
by the twelve fine brigades of Hill (first) and Longstreet, to
give the supposed flying enemy his death-blow. About five
miles from Darleytown, on the Newmarket road, we got sight
of the foe ; but they had taken up a splendid position. The
plain, thickly beset with trees at this point, and rough, broken
ground, was very unfavorable to the operations of our bravo
cavalry, and they were condemned to inaction.

320 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK.

General McClellan had taken his position at Frazier's farm,
which formed his centre. This point he had strengthened with
nineteen pieces of heavy artillery, had collected his best troops
there, and firmly and coolly awaited our attack. We had, at
all hazards, to drive the enemy from the neighborhood of our
capital or succumb ourselves. No other choice remained for
ns. But General McClellan only too well understood his criti-
cal position. By the folly of Gen. McDowell, the pitiful con-
duct of Secretary Stanton, and the political reasons of Com-
mander-in-chief Halleck, at Washington, he was offered up, as
it were to destruction. Many another general would, perhaps,
imder such dreadful circumstances, have sought death amid
the crash of battle. However, he did not hesitate a moment,
notwithstanding the frightful losses he had suffered during
those four days' struggles, to trust his fate, like an old and
gallant soldier, to the sword.

During that four days' massacre our troops had been trans-
formed into wild beasts, and hardly had they caught sight of
the enemy, drawn up in order, ere they rushed upon them
^yith horrible yells. Yet calmly, as on the parade-ground, the
hitter delivered their fire. The batteries in the centre dis-
charged their murderous volleys on our men, and great disor-
der ensued among the storming masses. General Lee sent all
his disposable troops to the rescue, but McClellan opened upon
these newly formed storming columns so hellish a fire that
even the coldest-blooded veteran lost his self-possession.
Whole ranks of our men were hurled to the ground. The
thunder of the cannon, the crackling of the musketry from a
hundred thousand combatants, mingled with the screams of
the wounded and the dying, were terrific to the ear and the
imagination. Thus raged the conflict within a comparatively
narrow space seven long hours, and yet not a foot of ground
was won. All our reserves had been led into the fight, and
the brigade of Wilcox was annihilated. At length the coming
of night compelled a truce, and utterly overcome by fatigue,
the soldier sank upon the ground at his post, thoughtless ot
even the friend torn from his side, and engrossed only with th
instinct of self-preservation. But " Water ! water !" was the
cry from the parched lips on all sides. The empty flasks con-
tained not a drop, alas ! and at length sleep overcame each

APPENDIX. 3f2l

ivorn-oul: warrinr, and even thirst and hunger were forgotten.
Gloomy and out of humor, Gen. Lee rode through the camping-
ground of the decimated regiments attended by liis staff, and
then, with a dry, harsh voice, ordered up the divisions of "Wise
and Magruder to bury the dead. With a brief remark, he nei^
indicated to Gen. Longstreet his position for the next day, and
rode off with his aids to visit other portions of the line.

THE SIXTH DAY AND THE SEVENTH, WJ^'H THE BATTLE OF MAL-
VERN HILL.

The gray of morning was just beginning to appear upon the
horizon when the roar of artillery was once more heard. A
battery which, during the night, Gen. Anderson had placed
nearer to the hostile lines was instantly noticed by the enemy
and vigorously attacked by his field-pieces. Every shot struck,
and the fragments were hurled in all directions. Of the twelve
pieces in the battery five were quickly dismounted and the
teams half destroyed, yet the commanding officer held his post.
In the mean while our columns had formed without having
tasted any strengthening or nourishing refreshment. Ex-
hausted by the fatigues of the preceding days, they fairly
reeled on their feet, yet not a man shrank back from duty.
At length, as the sun rose in splendor, and we could better
distinguish the enemy's positon, an involuntary exclamation
escaped me, for it was evident to me, from the denser ranks
he exhibited, that McClellan had been considerably reinforced
during the night, and could therefore withdraw his worn-out
troops from the foremost lines, and have an easy struggle with
fresh men against our famished and exhausted force.

Gen. Lee, convinced of the perilous position of affairs, at once
issued orders to Stonewall Jackson to cover the retreat in case
the army should be compelled to fall back, and directions were
sent to Richmond to get all the public property ready for im-
mediate removal. Then the divisions of Hill (second), Long-
street, Anderson, Cobb, and Whitcomb were ordered to storra
the enemy's works.

And now again commenced one of the most desperate com-
bats that ever took place in any war. The loss on our side was
absolutely frightful. McClellan, observing the devastation hia

21

322 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

artillery was making among our troops, called up a division of
reserves, and overwhelmed us with a terrific rain of musketry.
His masses pressed forward, step by step, nearer and nearer,
until at length some companies of ours threw their arms away
S,nd fled. McClellan availed himself of this panic, and ordered
a flank movement of his cavalry. Quick as thought Anderson
placed himself at the head of our horse, and led three regiments
to the charge. Their onset was magnificent. Our Texans burst
with ringing huzzas into the ranks of the foe, who, without even
giving us time to try our sabres, turned to the right-about ; but
here, too, the hostile field-pieces prevented further success, and
we had to draw back from before that crushing fire.

The enemy, noticing our confusion, now advanced with the
cry, " Onward to Richmond !" Yes, along the whole hostile
front rang the shout, " Onward to Richmond !" Many old
soldiers who had served in distant Missouri and on the plains
of Arkansas wept in the bitterness of their souls like children.
Of what avail had it been to us that our best blood had flowed
for six long days ? — of what avail all our unceasing and ex-
hanstless endurance ? Every thing, every thing seemed lost,
and a general depression came over all our hearts. Batteries
dashed past in headlong flight ; ammunition, hospital, and
supply wagons rushed along, and swept the troops away with
them from the battle-field. In vain the most frantic exertion,
entreaty, and self-sacrifice of the staff-officers. The troops had
lost their foothold, and all was over with the Southern Con-
federacy.

In this moment of desperation Gen. Hill came up with a few
regiments he had managed to rally ; but the enemy was con-
tinually pressing nearer and nearer, louder and louder their
shouts, and the watchword, " On to Richmond !" could be
heard. Cavalry officers sprang from tlieir saddles, and rushed
into the ranks of the infantry regiments, now deprived of their
proper officers. Gen. Hill seized the standard of the 4th North
Carolina regiment — which he had formerly commanded — and
sliouted to the soldiers : " If you will not follow me, I will
perish alone !" Upon this a number of officers dashed forward
to cover their beloved general with their bodies, the soldiers
hastily rallied, and the cry, " Lead on. Hill, head your old
North Carolina boys !" rose over the field. And now Hill

APPENDIX. 323

charged forward with this mass he had thus worked up to the
wildest enthusiasm. The, enemy halted when they saw these
columns, in flight a moment before, now advancing to the at-
tack, and Hill burst upon his late pursuers like a famished
lion. A fearful hand-to-hand conflict now ensued, for there
was no time to load and fire. The ferocity with which this
combat was waged was incredible. It was useless to beg the
exasperated men for quarter ; there was no moderation, no
pity, no compassion in that bloody work of bayonet and knife.
The son sank dying at his father's feet ; the father forgot that
he had a child — a dying child ; the brother did not see that a
brother was expiring a few paces from him ; the friend heard"
not the last groans of a friend ; all natural ties were dissolved ;
only one feeling, one thirst panted in every bosom — revenge.
Here it was that the son of Major Peyton, but fifteen years of
age, called to his father for help. A ball had shattered both
his legs. " When we have beaten the enemy, then I will help
you," answered Peyton ; " I have here other sons to lead to
glory. Forward !" But the column had advanced only a few
paces further when the major himself fell to the earth a corpse.
Prodigies of valor were here performed on both sides. His-
tory will ask in vain for braver soldiers than those who here
fought and fell. But of the demoniac fury of both parties one
at a distance can form no idea. Even the wounded, despair-
ing of succor, collecting their last energies of life, plunged their
knives into the bosoms of foemen who lay near them still
breathing.

The success of Gen. Hill enabled other generals to once
more lead their disorganized troops back to the fight, and the
contest was renewed along the whole line, and kept up until
deep into the night ; for every thing depended upon our keep-
ing the enemy at bay, counting, too, upon their exhaustion at
last, until fresh troops could arrive to reinforce us. At length,
about half-past ten in the evening, the divisions of Magruder,
Wise, and Holmes came up and deployed to the front of our
army. Had the commanders of these divisions executed their
orders with promptitude and skill, streams of blood would have
been spared, and the foe would have been thrown back upon
his reserves in the course of the forenoon ; but they reached
us fully seventeen hours behind time. The generals had been

324 THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAK.

uncertain concerning the marcliing orders, their columns crossed
each other and became entangled, and precious time was
irremediably lost. Still, as it was, the remainder of our force
had to thank the final arrival of these divisions for their rescue.

So soon as these reinforcements could be thrown to the front,
our regiments were drawn back, and as far as possible reorgan-
ized during the night, the needful officers appointed, and after
the distribution of provisions, which had also fortunately arrived,
measures were adopted for the gathering up of the wounded
and the burial of the dead.

On Tuesday, July first, at two o'clock in the morning, while
the stars were still visible in the sky, Gen. Magruder again
opened the battle, and very soon began a cannonade so fearful
that the very earth trembled with the concussion. By twelve
o'clock meridian McClellan had abandoned all his positions,
leaving behind his wounded, his baggage, and many pieces of
cannon. Magruder followed him, hot foot, but cautiously, as
he had first to sweep the surrounding woods with artillery and
sharpshooters.

About half-past four p. m. our troops reached the vicinity oi
the well-known farm of D. Carter, known as Malvern Hill.
Here Gen. McClellan had again drawn up his army to re-open
the fight. Gen. Magruder no sooner saw the enemy's position
than he once more led his men to the attack. His columns
advanced in magnificent order over the space that separated
them from the foe, and stormed the intrenched position. But
a murderous hail of grape received the brave fellows and
mowed them down, until finally the fragments of these splendid
divisions were compelled to seek the shelter of the woods.
Again Generals Smith, Anderson, and Holmes led on their
troops, but suddenly missiles of monstrous dimensions tore
down whole ranks of our soldiers and caused the most appall-
ing damage.

This was the fire of the fleet, which, although two and a
half miles distant, now took part in the contest. Our men still
rushed forward with desperate courage against the hostile po-
sition, and Malvern Hill was attacked on all sides. McClellan
defended himself courageously, and it was twelve o'clock ?.t
night ere he evacuated this position, which both nature and art

^-

APPENDIX. 325

had made a strong one. The lieroic daring and energy of our
troops had overcome all obstacles.

The battle of the seventh day will live forever in the mem-
ory of the people as the battle of Malvern Hill. Nowhere, in
all the actions fought around Eichmond, was the contest con-
fined within so small a space — and there was added to it the
fire of the monster guns on board the enemy's ships. It was
terrible to see those two hundred and sixty-eight-pound shell
crashing through the woods ; and when one exploded, it was
as though the globe had burst. Never, in any war since the
world began, were missiles of such magnitude before used. The
battle of Malvern Hill will be a monument for that people,
testifying to the determined will and resolution with which it
contended for its independence as a nation, and the indomita-
ble firmness of its vow to conquer or to die.

I must award to Gen. McClellan my fullest recognition.
There are few, if any, generals in the Union army who can
rival him. Left in the most desperate straits by his com-
panion in arms, McDowell ; victimized by the Secretary of
War, Stanton, ^^t "Washington ; oflered up as a sacrifice to des-
tiny by political jealousy ; cut off from his basis of retreat — he
selected a new line of safety, of which no one had even
dreamed. He defended every foot of ground with courage and
talent, and" his last stand at Malvern Hill, as well as his systeiri
of defence and his strategic combinations, displayed high mili-
tary ability. Yet his troops were too greatly demoralized by
their seven days' fighting, and lost their stamina, while several
of his generals could not comprehend the ideas of their com-
mander, and sustained him but poorly, or not at all. At Har-
rison's Landing, where the James river forms a curve, he col-
lected his shattered array under the guns of the Federal fleet.
But, on our side, we had no longer an army to molest him.

326 THE SECOND YEAE OF THE WAR.

n.

THE BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG AND THE CAMPAIGN
IN PENNSYLVANIA.

Diary of an English Officer in, the Confederate Army)

June 20 {Saturday). — Armed with letters of introduction
from the Secretary-at-war for Generals Lee and Longstreet, I
left Richmond at 6 a.m., to join the Virginian army. I was
accompanied by a sergeant of the Signal Corps, sent by my
kind friend Major Norris, for the purpose of assisting me in
getting on.

We took the train as far as Culpepper, and arrived there at
5.30 p. M., after having changed cars at Gordonsville, near which
place I observed an enormous pile of excellent rifles rotting in
the open air. These had been captured at CJ^ancellors ville ;
but the Confederates have already such a superabundant stock
of rifles that apparently they can affbrd to let them sj)oil. The
weather was quite cool after the rain of last night. The coun-
try through which we passed had been in the enemy's hands
last year, and was evacuated by them after the battles before
Richmond ; but at that time it was not their custom to burn,
destroy, and devastate — every thing looked green and beauti-
ful, and did not in the least give one the idea of a hot country.

In his late daring raid, the Federal General Stoneman crossed
this railroad, and destroyed a small portion of it, burned a few
buildings, and penetrated to within three miles of Richmond ;
but he and his men were in such a hurry that they had not
time to do much serious harm.

Culpepper was, until five days ago, the headquarters of Gen-
erals Lee and Longstreet ; but since Ewell's recapture of Win-
chester, the whole army had advanced with rapidity, and it
was my object to catch it up as quickly as possible.

On arriving at Culpepper, my sergeant handed me over to
another myrmidon of Major Norris, with orders from that offi-
cer to supply me with a horse, and take me himself to join Mr

APPENDIX. 327

Lawlej, wlio had passed tlirougli for the same purpose as myself
three days before.

Sergeant Norris, my new chaperon, is cousin to Major Nor-
ris, and is a capital fellow. Before the war he was a gentleman
of good means in Maryland, and was accustomed to a life of
luxury ; he now lives the life of a private soldier with perfect
contentment, and is utterly indifferent to civilization and com-
fort. Although he was unwell when I arrived, and it was
pouring with rain, he proposed that we should start at once —
6 P.M. I agreed, and we did so. Our horses had both sore
backs, were both unfed, except on grass, and mine was deficient
of a shoe. They nevertheless travelled well, and we reached a
hamlet called Woodville, fifteen miles distant, at 9.30. "We
had great difiiculty in procuring shelter, but at length we over-
came the inhospitality of a native, who gave us a feed of corn
for our horses, and a blanket on the floor for ourselves.

June 21 {Sunday). — We got the horse shod with some delay,
and after refreshing the animals with corn and ourselves with
bacon, we effected a start at 8.15 a.m. "We experienced con-
siderable difficulty in carrying my small saddle-bags and knap-
sack, on account of the state of our horses' backs. Mine was
not very bad, but that of Norris was in a horrid state. "We
had not travelled more than a few miles when the latter animal
cast a shoe, which took us an hour to replace at a village called
Sperryville. The country is really magnificent, but as it has
supported two large armies for two years, it is new completely
cleaned out. It is almost uncultivated, and no animals are
grazing where there used to be hundreds. All fences have
been destroyed, and numberless farms burnt, the chimneys alone
left standing. It is difficult to depict and impossible to exag-
gerate the sufferings which this part of Virginia has undergone.
But the ravages of war have not been able to destroy the beau-
ties of nature — the verdure is charming, the trees magnificent,
the country undulating, and the Blue Ridge mountains form
the background.

Being Sunday, we met about thirty negroes going to church,
wonderfully smartly dressed, some (both male and female) rid-
ing on horseback and others in wagons ; but Mr. ]^[orris informs
me that two years ago we should have numbered them by
hundreds.

328 THE SECOND YEAK OF THE WAK.

We soon began to catch up the sick and broken down men
of the army, but not in great numbers ; most of them were
well shod, though I saw two without shoes.

After crossing a gap in the Blue Ilidge r^nge, we reached
Front Eoyal at 5 p. m., and we were now in the well-known
Shenandoah Yalley — the scene of Jackson's celebrated cam-
paigns. Front Royal is a pretty little place, and was the
theatre of one of the earliest tights in the war, which was com-
menced by a Maryland regiment of Confederates, who, as Mr.
Norris observed, "jumped on to" a Federal regiment from the
same State, and " whipped it badly." Since that time the vil-
lage has changed hands continually, and was visited by the
Federals only a few days previous to E well's rapid advance
ten days ago.

After immense trouble we procured a feed of corn for the
horses, and, to Mr. Norris's astonishment, I was impudent
enough to get food for ourselves by appealing to the kind feel-
ings of two good-looking female citizens of Front Royal, who,
during our supper, entertained us by stories of the manner
they annoyed the northern soldiers by disagreeable allusions to
" Stonewall Jackson."

We started again at 6.30, and crossed two branches of the
Shenandoah river, a broad and rapid stream. Both the rail-
way and carriage bridges having been destroyed, we had to
ford it ; and as the water was deep, we were only just able to
accomplish the passage. The soldiers, of whom there were a
number with us, took off their trousers and held their rifles
and ammunition above their heads.

Soon afterwards our horses became very leg-weary ; for
although the weather had been cool, the roads were muddy
and hard upon them.

At 8.30 we came up with Pender's division encamped on the
sides of hills, illuminated with innumerable camp-fires, which
looked very picturesque. After passing through about two
miles of bivouacs we begged for shelter in the hayloft of a Mr.
Mason : we turned our horses into a field, and found our hay-
loft most luxurious after forty-six miles ride at a foot's pace.

Stonewall Jackson is considered a regular demigod in this
country.

June 22 {Monday). — We started without food or corn at 6.30

APPENDIX. 329

A. M., and soon became entangled with Pender's division on its
line of march, which delayed us a good deal. My poor brute
of a horse also took this opportunity of throwing two more
shoes, which we found it impossible to replace, all the black-
smiths' shops having been pressed by the troops.

The soldiers of this division are a remarkably fine body of
men, and look quite seasoned and ready for any work. Their
clothing is serviceable, so also are their boots ; but there is the
'usual utter absence of uniformity as to color and shape of their
garments and hats ; gray of all shades and brown clothing with
felt hats predominate. The Confederate troops are now entirely
armed with excellent rifles, mostly Enfields. When they first
turned out, they were in the habit of wearing numerous revol-
vers and bowie-knives. General Lee is said to have mildly re-^
marked, "Gentlemen, I think you will find an Enfield rifle, a
bayonet, and sixty rounds of ammunition as much as you can
conveniently carry in the way of arms." They laughed and
thought they knew better; but the six-shooters and bowie-
knives gradually disappeared, and now none are to be seen
among the infantry.

The artillery horses are in poor condition, and only get three
pounds of corn a-day. The artillery is of all kinds — Parrotts,
Napoleons, rifled and smooth bores, all shapes and sizes; most
of them bear the letters U. S., showing that they have changed
masters.

The colors of the regiments difi'er from the blue battle-flags
I saw with Bragg's army. They are generally red, with a blue
St. Andrew's- Cross showing the stars. This pattern is said to
have been invented by Gen. Joseph Johnston, as not so liable
to be mistaken for the Yankee flag. The new Confederate flag
has evidently been adopted from this battle-flag, as it is called.
Most of the colors in this division bear the names Manassas,
Fredericksburg, Seven Pines, Hai-per's Ferry, Chancellors-
ville, &c.

I saw no stragglers during the time I was with Pender's
division ; but although the Yirginian army certainly does
get over a great deal of ground, yet they move at a slow
dragging pace, and are evidently not good marchers nat-
urally. As Mr. Norris observed to me, " Before this war
we were a lazy set of devils ; our niggers worked for us, and

330 THE SECOND YEAB OF THE WAR.

none of us ever dreamed of walking, though we all rode a great
deal."

We reached Berrjville (eleven miles) at 9 a.m. The head-
quarters of Gen. Lee are a few hundred yards beyond this
place. Just before getting there, I saw a general officer of
handsome appearance, who must, I knew from description, be
the Commander-in-chief ; but as he was evidently engaged I
did not join him, although I gave my letter of introduction to
one of his staff. Shortly afterwards, I presented myself to '
Mr. Lawley, with whom I became immediately great friends.
He introduced me to Gen. Chilton, the Adjutant-general of the
Army, to Col. Cole, the Quartermaster-general, to Capt. Yen-
ables, and other officers of Gen. Lee's staff; and he suggested,
"^s the headquarters were so busy and crowded, that he and I
should ride to Winchester at once, and afterwards ask for
hospitality from the less busy staff of Gen. Longstreet. I was
also introduced to Capt. Schreibert of the Prussian army, who
is a guest sometimes of Gen. Lee and sometimes of Gen. Stuart
of the cavalry. He had been present at one of the late severe
cavalry skirmishes, which have been of constant occurrence
since the sudden advance of this army. This advance has
been so admirably timed as to allow of the capture of Win-
chester, with its Yankee garrison and stores, and at the same
time of the seizure of the gaps of the Blue Ridge range. All
the officers were speaking with regret of the severe wound
received in this skirmish by Major Yon Borke, another Prus-
sian, but now in the Confederate States service, and aid-de-
camp to Jeb Stuart.

After eating some breakfast, Lawley and I rode ten miles
into Winchester. My horse, minus his fore-shoes, showed signs
of great fatigue, but we struggled into Winchester at 5 p.m.,
where I was .fortunate enough to procure shoes for the horse,
and, by Lawley's introduction, admirable quarters for both of

us at the house of the hospitable Mrs. , with whom he

had lodged seven months before, and who was charmed to see
him. Her two nieces, who are as agreeable as they are good-
looking, gave us a miserable picture of the three captivities
they have experienced under the Federal commanders, Banks,
Shields, and Mih*oy.

The unfortunate town of Winchester seems to have been

APPENDIX. 331

made a regular shuttlecock of bj the contending armies.
Stonewall Jackson rescued it once, and last Sunday weet his
successor, Gen. Ewell, drove out Milroj. The name of Milroy
is always associated with that of Butler, and his rule in Win-
chester seems to have been somewhat similar to that of his
illustrious rival in New Orleans. Should either of these two
individuals fall alive into the hands of the Confederates, I im-
agrine that Jeff. Davis himself would be unable to save their
lives, even if he were disposed to do so.

Before leaving Richmond, I heard every one expressing
regret that Milroy should have escaped, as the recapture of
Winchester seemed to be incomplete without him. More than
four thousand of his men were taken in the two forts which
overlook the town, and which were carried by assault by a
Louisianian brigade with trifling loss.

The joy of the unfortunate inhabitants may easily be con-
ceived at this sudden and unexpected relief from their last
captivity, which had lasted six months. During the whole of
this time they could not legally buy an article of provisions
without taking the oath of allegiance, which they magnani-
mously refused to do.

* They were unable to hear a word of their male relations or
friends, who were all in the Southern army ; they were shut
up in their houses after 8 p.m., and sometimes deprived of light ;
part of our kind entertainer's house was forcibly occupied by
a vulgar, ignorant, and low-born Federal officer, ci-devant
driver of a street car ; and they were constantly subjected to
the most humiliating insults, on pretence of searching the house
for arms, documents, &c.

To my surprise, however, these ladies spoke of the enemy
with less violence and rancor than almost any other ladies I
had met with during my travels through the whole Southern
Confederacy. When I told them so, they replied that they
who had seen many men shot down in the streets before their
own eyes knew what they were talking about, which other and
more excited Southern women did not.

Swell's division is in front and across the Potomac, and
before I left headquarters this morning I saw Longstreet's corps
beginning to follow in the same direction.

June 23 {Tuesday). — Lawley and I went to inspect the site

333 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE WAR.

of Mr. Mason's (the Southern Commissioner in London) once
pretty house — a melancholy scene. It had been charmingly-
situated near the outskirts of the town, and by all accounts
must have been a delightful little place. When Lawley saw
it seven months ago, it was then only a ruin ; but since that
time Northern vengeance (as directed by Gen. Milroy) has
satiated itself by destroying almost the very foundations of the
house of this arch-traitor, as they call him. Literally, not one
stone remains standing upon another ; and the debris seems to
have been carted away, for there is now a big hole where the
principal part of the house stood. Troops have evidently
been encamped upon the ground, which was strewed with
fragments of Yankee clothing, accoutrements, &c.

I understand that Winchester used to be a most agreeable
little town, and its society extremely pleasant. Many of its
houses are now destroyed or converted into hospitals ; the rest
look miserable and dilapidated. Its female inhabitants (for
the able-bodied males are all absent in the army) are familiar
with the bloody realities of war. As many as 5000 wounded
have been accommodated here at one time. All the ladies are
accustomed to the bursting of shells and the sight of fighting,
and all are turned into hospital nurses or cooks. '

From the utter impossibility of procuring corn, I was forced
to take the horses out grazing a mile beyond the town for four
hours in the morning and two in the afternoon. As one
mustn't lose sight of them for a moment, this occupied me all
day, while Lawley wrote in the house.

In the evening we went to visit two wounded officers in

Mrs. 's house, a major and a captain in the Louisiana

brigade which stormed the forts last Sunday week. I am
afraid the captain will die. Both are shot through the body,
but are cheery. They served under Stonewall Jackson until
his death, and they venerate his name, though they both agree
that he has got an efficient successor in Ewell, his former com-
panion in arms; and they confirmed a great deal of what Gen.
Johnston had told me as to Jackson having been so much in-
debted to Ewell for several of his victories. They gave us an
animated account of the spirits and feeling of the army.

At no period of the war, they say, have the men been so
well equipped, so well clothed, so eager for a fight, or so con-

APPENDIX. 333

fident of success — a very different state of affairs from that
which characterized the Maryland invasion of last year, when
half of the army were barefooted stragglers, and many of the
remainder unwilling and reluctant to cross the Potomac.

Miss told me to-day that dancing and horse-racing are

forbidden by the Episcopal Church in this part of Virginia.

June 24 {Wednesday). — Lawley being in weak health, we
determined to spend another day with our kind friends in
Winchester.

I took the horses out again for six hours to graze, and made
acquaintance with two Irishmen, who gave me some cut grass
and salt for the horses. One of these men had served and had
been wounded in the Southern army. I remarked to him that
he must have killed lots of his own countrymen ; to which he
replied, "Oh yes, but faix they must all take it as it comes."
I have always observed that Southern Irishmen make excellent
" Rebs," and have no sort of scruple in killing as many of their
Northern brethren as they possibly can.

I observed to-day many new Yankee graves, which the

deaths among the captives are constantly increasing. Wooden

head-posts are put at each grave, on which is written, " An

'Unknown Soldier, U. S. A. Died of wounds received upon the

field of battle, June 21, 22, or 23, 1863."

A sentry stopped me to-day as I was going out of town, and
when I showed him my pass from Gen. Chilton, he replied
with great firmness, but with perfect courtesy, " I am extreme-
ly sorry, sir, but if you were the Secretary of War, or Jeff.
Davis himself, you couldn't pass without a passport from the
Provost-Marshal,"

June 25 {Thursday). — We took leave of Mrs. and her

hospitable family, and started at 10 a. m. to overtake Generals
Lee and Longstreet, M^ho are supposed to be crossing the Po-
tomac at Williamsport. Before we had got more than a few
miles on our way, we began to meet horses and oxen, the first
fruits of Ewell's advance into Pennsylvania. The weather
was cool and showery, and all went swimmingly for the first
fourteen miles, when we caught up M'Laws' division, which
belongs to Longstreet's corps.

As my horse about this time began to show signs of fatigue,
and as Lawley's pickaxed most alarmingly, we turned them

334: THE SECOND TEAR OF THE WAR.

into some clover to graze, whilst we watched two brigades pass
along the road. They are commanded, I think, by Semmes and
Barksdale,* and are composed of Georgians, Mississippians, and
South Carolinians. They marched very well, and there was
no attempt at straggling ; quite a different state of things from
Johnston's men in Mississippi. All were well shod and effi-
ciently clothed. In rear of each regiment were from twenty to
thirty negro slaves, and a certain number of unarmed m'en car-
rying stretchers, and wearing in their hats the red badges of the
ambulance corps ; — this is an excellent institution, for it prevents
un wounded men falling out on pretence of taking wounded to
the rear. The knapsacks of the men still bear the names of the
Massachusetts, "Vermont, New Jersey, or other regiments to
which they originally belonged. There were about twenty
wagons to each brigade, most of which were marked U. S., and
each of these brigades was about 2,800 strong. There are four
brigades in M'Laws' division. All the men seemed in the high-
est spirits, and were cheering and yelling most vociferously.

"We reached Martinsburg (twenty-two miles) by 6 p. m., by
which time my horse nearly broke down, and I was forced to
get off and walk. Martinsburg and this part of Virginia is
^supposed to be more Unionist than Southern ; however, many
of the women went through the form of cheering M'Laws' di-
vision as it passed. I dare say they would perform the same
ceremony in honor of the Yankees to-morrow.

Three miles beyond Martinsburg we were forced by the state
of our horses to insist upon receiving the unwilling hospitality
of a very surly native, who was evidently Unionist in his pro-
clivities. We were obliged to turn our horses into a field to
graze during the night. This is most dangerous, for the Con-
federate soldier, in spite of his many virtues, is, as a rule, the
most incorrigible horse-stealer in the world.

June 26 {Friday). — I got up a little before daylight, and
notwithstanding the drenching rain, I secured our horses,
which, to my intense relief, were present. But my horse
showed a back rapidly getting worse, and both looked " mean"
to a degree.

Lawley being ill, he declined starting in the rain, and our

Barksdale was killed, and Semmes wovmded, at the battle of Gettysburg

APPENDIX. 835

host became more and more surly when we stated our intention
of remaining with him. However, the sight of real gold iu'
stead of Confederate paper, or even greenbacks, soothed him
wonderfully, and he furnished us with some breakfast. All
this time M'Laws' division was passing the door, but so strict
was the discipline, that the only man who loafed in was imme-
diately pounced upon and carried away captive. At 2 p. m.,
the weather having become a little clearer, we made a start,
but under very unpromising circumstances. Lawley was so
ill that he could hardly ride ; his horse was most unsafe, and
had cast a shoe ; — my animal was in such a miserable state
that I had not the inhumanity to ride him ; but, by the as-
sistance of his tail, I managed to struggle through the deep
mud and wet. We soon became entangled with M'Laws' di-
vision, and reached the Potomac, a distance of nine miles and
a half, at 5 p. m. ; the river is both wide and deep, and in ford-
ing it (for which purpose I was obliged to mount) we couldn't
keep our legs out of the water.

The little town of Williamsport is on the opposite bank of
the river, and we were now in Maryland.

We had the mortification to learn that Generals Lee and
Longstreet had quitted Williamsport this morning at 1 1 o'cloc'k,
and were therefore obliged to toil on to Hagerstown, six miles
further. This latter place is evidently by no means rebel in
its sentiments, for all the houses were shut up, and many ap-
parently abandoned. The few natives that were about stared
at the troops with sulky indifference.

After passing through Hagerstown, we could obtain no
certain information of tlie whereabouts of the two generals,
nor could we get any willing hospitality from any one ; but at
9 p. M., our horses being quite exhausted, we forced ourselves
into the house of a Dutchman, who became a little more civil
at the sight of gold, although the assurance that we were
English travellers, and not rebels, had produced no effect. I
had walked to-day, in mud and rain, seventeen miles, and I
dared not take off my solitary pair of boots, because I knew I
should never get them on again.

June 27 {Saturday). — Lawley was so ill this morning that
he couldn't possibly >ride ; I therefore mounted his horse a
little before daybreak, and started in search of the generals.

836 THE SECOND TEAR OP THE WAK.

After riding eight miles, I came up with Gen. Loiigstreet, at
6.30 A. M., and was only just in time, as he was on the point
of moving. Both he and his staif were most kind, when I in-
troduced myself and stated my difficulties ; he arranged that
an ambulance should fetch Lawley, and he immediately in
vited me to join his mess during the campaign ; he told me
(which I did not know) that we were now in Pennsylvania, the
enemy's country — Maryland being only ten miles broad at th'S
point ; he declared that Bushwhackers exist in' the woods, who
shoot unsuspecting stragglers, and it would therefore be unsafe
that Lawley and I should travel alone.

Gen. Longstreet is an Alabaraian — a thickset man, forty-
three years of age ; he was an infantry major in the old army,
and now commands the 1st corps d'armee ; he is never far
from Gen. Lee, who relies very much upon his judgment. By
the soldiers he is invariably spoken of as " the best fighter in
the whole army."

Whilst speaking of entering upon the enemy's soil, he said
to me that although it might be fair, in just retaliation, to apply
the torch^ yet that doing so would demoralize the army and
ruin its now excellent discipline. Private property is, there-
fore, to be rigidly protected.

At 7 A. M., I returned with an orderly (or courier, as they
are called) to the farmhouse in which I had left Lawley, and
after seeing all arranged satisfactorily about the ambulance, I
rode slowly on to rejoin Gen. Longstreet, near Chambersburg,
which is a Pennsylvania town, distant twenty-two miles from
Hagerstown. I M'^as with McLaws' division, and observed that
the moment they entered Pennsylvania the troops opened the
fences and enlarged the road about twenty yards on each side,
which enabled the wagons and themselves to proceed together :
this is the only damage I saw done by the Confederates.

This part of Pennsylvania is very flourishing, highly culti-
vated, and, in comparison with the Southern States, thickly
peopled. But all the cattle and horses having been seized by
Ewell, farm labor had now come to a complete stand-still.

In passing through Greencastle, we found all the houses and
windows shut up, the natives in their Sunday clothes standing
at their doors regarding the troops in a very unfriendly man-
ner. I saw no straggling into the houses, nor were any of the

APrKNPix. 337

inhabitants disturbed or annoyed by the soldiers. Sentries
were placed at the doors of many of the best houses, to preven